Quinntana Week 2013
by headcannon
Summary: Collections of one-shots prompted by the themes given for Quinntana Week 2013. Ratings vary between G and M. Any continuations of these stories will not be under this title. I'm going to keep this a series of one-shots. New fics will be posted under their own titles.
1. Monday: Making the List

**Title:** Making the List  
**Prompt:** Popular Girl and Nerd, QW 2013  
**Note:** This was supposed to be a one-shot and may read like it; though, it could definitely also be read as the intro to a multi-chapter. I'll be honest and say that this did not turn out as I planned - but I offer it up, anyway. Consider it an exercise to get me going for the week …

From where she leaned against her locker, Santana scanned the frantic herd of her peers trying to make it to class before the second bell. She rolled her eyes, noting the same faces she saw the day before, the day before that and every school day for as long as she could remember. It was like being stuck in a Groundhog's Day loop - only she knew she wasn't because that day Suzie Pepper got hit with a blue slushie and she's pretty sure that the day before it was a red one for the Jewish kid with the crazy hair.

Joshua. No - Jason. Jacob?

Santana squinted as she tried to remember. Almost as quickly as she started thinking about it, she rolled her eyes, annoyed with herself for wasting brain power on something so trivial. It's not like she cared what his name was. She could start calling him Jewfro and everyone would think he'd legally changed his name.

That was the kind of power Santana Lopez had at McKinley High.

It was the power that came from being head Cheerio. Her position came equipped with the uniform, the high pony and a watchdog in the form of Sue Sylvester. The Cheerio coach (and nine time national champion) made sure the stench of teen angst never wafted in the direction of her red and white-clad pyramid.

The power also came from being the captain (and only undefeated member) of the debate club. In her entire educational career, no one - student or teacher - beat Santana in a war of words. Her no-nonsense approach to debate left others with little to argue. She told it like it was and left her opponents to their soft, politically correct language.

And the power came from being co-captain of the Glee Club, an honor she shared with Rachel Berry. Santana could have taken over leadership of the club but she didn't really want it. What she wanted was to perform – and not in the background as Rachel had tried to persuade her to do. When she mentioned, seemingly out of nowhere, that she was considering throwing her hat into the Glee Club election for captain, the other girl decided it was time to barter. In the end, they agreed to share leadership – and solos at competition shows.

With each performance, she backed up the talk of her being a "star" student.

It was a power that few understood and many envied.

The result of everyone finding out that Blaine and Kurt were dating was nearly a month's worth of harassment and name calling. They kept their relationship quiet and did their best not to rock the boat, but word got out. They just wanted to be together - not to be poster boys for a cause (or a target). It took some time, but eventually the jeers quieted, the shoulder-checking stopped and the slushies sailed in other directions. The boys attributed it to the inception of an acceptance group, the ridiculously named GayLesBAll - god, how Santana hated how many capital letters existed in that one word.

Of course, there was no backlash at all when Santana pulled her then-girlfriend, a tall, blonde girl in a Cheerio uniform, onto a table in the cafeteria and shouted, "Listen up, losers! This is my girlfriend, Brittany. If even one drop of slushie touches her, I will end you and everyone you know." A week later, she jumped onto the same table, a different girl on her arm and announced, "Hey, losers! You're messin' with me if you're messin' with my girl, T. Ain't nobody got time for that, feel me?" Every few weeks, she interrupted lunch to introduce her newest girlfriend, to make another blanket threat and to make her exit by flipping the room the bird over her shoulder.

The last such visit to the cafeteria hadn't been for weeks.

"Looking for a co-Queen?" Blaine asked, settling his shoulder against the locker next to Santana's.

She smirked. "You applying? 'Cause, I gotta tell you, I think _your _co-queen might have a problem with that."

"Ha and ha." He rolled his eyes and clarified, "I meant a date for prom. No doubt you'll be crowned, so … co-queen."

"I knew what you meant and I know one thing for sure – she's not here. Look at them," she said nodding to the mass of bodies pushing each other through the halls. "Sheep. They're all even starting to look the same."

"Come to the GayLesBAll," he suggested with his best smile. Santana had to admit it was a good smile. Friendly, genuine and not too toothy. God, how she hated overly-toothy smiles. She was never sure if those people were trying to be friendly or warning her that they bite.

Which, okay, not always a bad thing.

"Pretty sure I already told you I'm not interested."

"How do you know you're not interested if you haven't gone."

"Haven't had a lobotomy or seen any shows whose names end in "_on ice"_, yet I know I'm not interested," Santana replied drolly. "I was blessed with the gift of decisiveness, not to mention luxurious hair, killer legs and, c'mon, my rack is pretty magnificent, too" Her brow twitched upward and she added, "Not that I expect you would notice."

Blaine let out a long sigh and frowned. "But half the girls you go out with aren't even gay." He points across the hall to a girl with long black hair and said, "Like her. How did you even get her to go out with you?"

"I asked her." Santana replied simply. Her eyes narrowed and she asked, "And how would you know if she's gay? Your gaydar is set to Lance Bass, not Portia de Rossi."

"Santana," he began, "I saw her picketing the bookstore when they started carrying the Advocate."

"No shit? Do they have Curve, too?"

"Not the point, Santana! Come to the meeting."

Santana rolled her eyes and shook her head. "I'm not going, so go find your boyfriend and play with his GayLesBAlls."

Just as the first bell rang, warning students to scurry even faster to their next classes, a blonde whirlwind stopped in front of Blaine.

"Hello, Mr. Anderson," she said with one eyebrow quirked. "You disappoint me. Well, actually, this school disappoints me. GoT is cancelled today. We lost the field to - " her eyes skirted to the girl standing next to her friend and she stammered. "Oh, uh." Her gaze flicked back over to Blaine and she quickly blurted out, "We lost the field, so, no play today."

"No! Really?!" the boy whined. "I was going to unveil my new House of Lannister flag."

Santana watched the girl, the former loser known as Queer Freakbray, talk animatedly to Blaine. She squinted, her nose crinkling in confusing at the girl's shirt: GoT LARP?

"What's that mean? It sounds like a disease," she interrupted, pointing to the other girl's chest. Quinn's eyes followed the outstretched finger. "No offense or anything, Q."

"Quinn," she corrected Santana, to which she received an eye roll and dismissive shrug.

There wasn't a soul in the school who didn't know Quinn's name. Before she became McKinley's student body's most valuable asset, she was their easiest target. Not only did she throw off the curve in all of her classes, but she wasn't even the least bit apologetic about it. Why should she dumb herself down for the benefit of others? She wouldn't expect anyone to do that for her if she was in their shoes. And, anyway, if she did that, then her early acceptance letter from M.I.T. might not be posted on the fridge with her mom's favorite magnet - a gift from Quinn that read "Moms. Not all superheroes wear capes."

As M.I.T. was the goal that fueled her refusal to lower her academic standards, the life she was looking forward to when she left Lima fueled her refusal to bow to the demands of her peers. She stubbornly held on to her love of the fantastic - to books, movies and video games. The small amount of tutoring money she allowed herself to spend was used to create a large collection of t-shirts from her favorite websites: teefury, fivefingertees, snorg and HRC. Whether it was a quote from _Serenity_, a Harry Potter fan drawing, an homage to old-school gaming or a large equal sign, Quinn took seriously wearing her heart on her sleeve - or chest, as it may be.

It only took Quinn an academic year (plus a couple of weeks) to move from untouchable to irreplaceable.

It started when she was assigned an article on Santana Lopez, a sophomore and the youngest Cheerio to be named captain. They met on the bleachers - Santana talked into a recorder while intermittently stopping to yell an order to her new charges. As Quinn asked questions, a student photographer was supposed to be taking pictures. The problem was that Noah Puckerman couldn't be trusted to focus on one pretty girl talking when there was an entire squad of pretty girls jumping around in short skirts. Of the forty-something pictures he took, three were of Santana and all were of her open-mouthed or with eyes half-closed mid-word.

He didn't accept the position because he liked taking pictures. He just thought that, with a press pass, he'd be the only guy in school allowed to go into the girl's locker room with a camera. When he learned that wasn't the case, he quit.

It was, of course, Quinn who made sure Santana looked amazing in her front page spread. She couldn't have her first story be coupled with such shoddy images. With her dad's digital SLR, she stalked to the football field during practice and took a series of shots of the squad, of Santana leading them and of Santana at the top of the pyramid. After practice, she waited around to get a couple of head shots of the head cheerio out of uniform. If there was one thing Quinn seemed to know, it was how to complete a task the right way.

It wasn't long before the name-calling stopped and she became everyone's best friend - or at least their go-to-girl for almost everything. Rachel Berry went directly to Quinn, tech master (because the word mistress made her giggle), for lighting cues before her big solo in the spring talent show. Brittany Pierce stopped her multiple times almost every day asking if she could help her charge her phone, laptop, and even her curling iron (even Quinn couldn't help her with that last one). Sam Evans begged her to tutor him and even referred her to his teammates who were struggling in their studies. And when Blaine came to her asking for assistance in creating a safe space for students "like them," she didn't even blink before accepting the task of organizing and sharing the leadership of the GayLesBAll.

Quinn didn't comment on the other girl's remark about her shirt and, instead, just let Blaine know she'd let him know when their game would be rescheduled. She offered them both a tiny wave before shuffling down the hall.

Santana watched the girl walk away, her head tilting and her eyes narrowing as she stared at the girl's back. She watched short blonde hair bounce with every step Quinn took. Few girls paired t-shirts with skirts, but somehow, Quinn was able to pull it off. After allowing herself to appreciate the other girls legs and where they attached to her slim body, Santana's eyes lit up.

With a quick nod at Blaine, she asked, "What about her?"

"What about her?" he asked, confused.

"The gel's finally seeping into your brain cells. Don't say I didn't warn you, " Santana noted as she experimentally poked his hair. He waved his hands around his head as though trying to rid himself of a bothersome fly and she crossed her arms over her chest.

"What about her," she teased with a coy smile and then, with brows high, her smile grew confident and she suggested, "for co-Queen?"

"Quinn Fabray," Blaine checked, his hand self-consciously hovering over his hair. An affirming nod was the girl's only reply. "Quinn - and you?" He closed his eyes and shook his head. "No."

"Why not?"

"Because she's Quinn, Santana," he tried to explain. "She's Targaryen and you're … well, you're - you don't even know what that is."

With a confident smile, Santana pushed off of the locker and pointed to Blaine. "Then she'll just have to tell me all about it - perhaps as we enjoy our date on prom night. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to make a guest appearance in the computer lab."

Santana strode purposefully leaving Blaine running to catch up with her."Just don't use your usual _bull in a china shop_ tactic, okay? Quinn's really smart and she's super sweet. And I feel like maybe if you scared her she'd be scarred for life. She isn't like the other girls you've gone out with." He walked quickly beside her, hoping that at least some of what he was saying was getting through.

"Which is why I'm asking _her _and not any of the other girls I've gone out with. Worry not your hard-shelled head. I got this, girlfriend." And with that, she shooed him away.

From where Santana leaned in the doorway, she watched as Quinn's fingers danced feverishly over the keyboard. The girl had her iPod on, ear buds firmly in place, and Santana wondered if the girl knew that she bit her bottom lip when she was so intently concentrating.

"Hey," she said and, keeping the bull versus china shop thing in mind, approached Quinn slowly.

Quinn rolled her eyes to the side, her brows furrowing when she saw who was talking to her. "Did you need something, Santana?"

"In a manner of speaking …"

"Okay, just give me a minute. I just have to touch up the photo I'm using for this article and I'm all yours." Quinn flashed a tiny smile and just as quickly as she had looked up at Santana, her eyes were back on the computer screen.

"S'at Kitty?" Santana asked, pointing to the image Quinn was re-touching.

The other girl nodded. "Coach wanted her to be the penultimate Cheerio profile since she'll be captain next year. Yours," she adds, "as you know, will be the final profile this year."

Santana watched the other girl erase blemishes, whiten Kitty's smile and, to be honest, she wasn't not sure what that last thing was, but Kitty's face didn't seem so sharp and hard anymore. "Can we talk while you do that or does it take, like, crazy concentration to edit the bitch from Kitty's face?'

Quinn snorted and, with an added chuckle, said, "I've had enough experience to be able to hold a conversation."

The _Lost Girl_ screen caps she posted online didn't color correct themselves. And those _Rizzoli and Isles _manipulations? Well, she wasn't a magician as her online friends purported.

Taking the seat next to the girl, Santana smoothed her cheer skirt over her lap and answered, "I need a date for prom."

"Okay …" the other girl slowly said. "And you want me to what? Sign you up for ?" Quinn wrinkled her nose and shook her head as she side-eyed Santana. "You know it's not necessary, right?"

At Santana's blank stare, Quinn continued, "There are a bunch of girls you could ask. Some of them you haven't even dated, yet. In fact, off the top of my head, I can't even come up with anyone who would turn you down."

"I'm sure we can come up with one person who would say 'no'. And, anyway, what bunch of girls?" Santana asked curiously. "Because I don't just want some random girl on my arm. She'd be my co-Queen, y'know? Here's the thing …"

Santana spent the next half an hour explaining that she was bored with the girls at McKinley. She had considered asking someone from Carmel, but then she remembered that she loathed everyone she'd ever met from their rival school. When Quinn asked her about the Dalton Academy for Girls, Santana just gave her a blank look as though having never heard of it before – even though their Glee Club just beat them at Regionals.

Santana spent three years hooking up with girls she was only slightly interested in and who, she was sure, only dated her for what she could do for their social standing. But with prom coming up, she didn't want to show up with a "been there, done that" date. She wanted someone fresh and exciting. She wanted someone who could keep up with her and who didn't require frequent "explanation" breaks when conversing. Santana wanted to finish her high school career right - with the perfect prom and the perfect prom date.

Prom was supposed to be a night she'd always remember. She was starting to grow frustrated by the thought that, if she remembered it all, it would be because she was disappointed that it was like every other dance she'd attended - accompanied by a girl like every other girl she'd gone with.

Quinn held up her finger to stop the other girl, and twisted in her seat to rummage through her bag. When she righted herself, she had a notebook (the cover of which read had a cookie wearing glasses and "Smart Cookie" written above it) and a pen. "Write down your standards and I'll see who I can come up with."

"But -"

Quinn shoved the notebook at her and nodded. "Standards." She gave the other girl a gentle smile and said, "I know every girl in our graduating class, Santana. All, except for you, asked me to touch up their senior pictures."

"Please, like I'm not perfectly photogenic."

"Regardless, I know every senior and a lot of other students, as well. Give me your wish list and I'll see who best fits it, okay?"

By the time Quinn's article was complete, Kitty's photo was magazine-quality and both items were saved on the server, Santana had finished her list. The other girl looked it over with a critical eye, frowning at bullet point number one, written in Santana's looping script.

"Gorgeous?" the girl asked, her lips pulled down.

"Yearbooks are forever, Q," Santana answered. "Date's gotta look good enough to be placed in a time capsule."

"Quinn," she corrected the other girl - again. But she didn't scribble out Santana's first item. She tapped the paper with her pen and curiously asked, "Smart?"

"I'm not saying I need someone to assemble a robot for me, but y'know, keeping up with the conversation might be nice," Santana said, justifying her request. "Contrary to popular belief, I'm not looking to waste my time parading around with eye candy on my arm."

"Okay, gorgeous but not eye candy," Quinn noted. "Item three is self-evident. As this is a date for a dance, said person should be able to dance. But, the fourth item -"

"Someone unexpected."

"Why?"

"Because the unexpected is boring and I'm sick of being bored. So?" Santana asked, looking intently into the other girl's eyes. "Can you find someone like that?"

Quinn nodded and pulled the notebook closer. "You're missing item five." She tapped her finger against the paper as she suggested, "Popular."

"You think I care about that? Right now, just by sitting in this room with you, _your _stock has gone up ten points."

"Except that I'm not for sale."

"Whatever, you have my list," Santana said firmly, her finger tapping very near where the other girl's rested on the page. "I didn't ask you to edit it. I asked if you knew anyone who fit that description. Got it?"

Quinn nodded and pulled up the yearbook layout. She could have tried to go off of memory, but having a list of names and photos at her fingertips would no doubt make her search easier. As she scanned the photos, scrolling through them so quickly that they seemed a blur to Santana, the other girl asked, "You got a date yet?"

"Me?" Quinn asked, already shaking her head. "I'm attending as a representative for the school paper and as a yearbook staff member. Camera'll be my date, I guess."

"But can your camera dance?"

"Haven't asked. I try not to let my work relationships become personal," Quinn joked. "Okay, what about Rachel Berry?" She pointed to the monitor where Rachel's senior picture smiled back at them.

"Doesn't fit the criteria, Q. Next."

"It's Quinn and what criteria doesn't she fit? She's gorgeous, smart, can dance and, really, who would expect you to ask her? I can't promise she's into girls but that doesn't seem to have been an issue for you so far." She offered Santana a quick smile and said, "If any girl has a shot with her, it's you."

"Okay, let's do a quick something here," Santana suggested. "Because your definition of gorgeous seems to be off the charts wrong, I'm gonna name someone and you tell me if she's hot or not. Ready?"

Quinn frowned, leaning back in her chair. A tiny shoulder shrug was the other girl's cue to continue.

"Penny from Big Bang."

"She's cute, I guess."

"Wrong. Hot." Santana rolled her eyes. "Okay, Marnie from Girls."

"Is she the one with the tattoos?"

"Nevermind." Santana let out a huff and crossed her arms over her chest. "Why don't you tell me who you think is hot? Besides Rachel Berry."

"You wouldn't know my people," Quinn answered simply. "They aren't your type."

"Try me."

"Summer Glau." When Santana's only reply is a blink, she offered, "Lena Heady."

"Okay, someone hot who wasn't in a television show about robots."

Quinn frowned. "What's wrong with robots? For your information, I plan to go into robotic engineering."

Her intense fear of Terminators led Quinn's unfettered focus on trying to understand artificial intelligence so that, if ever robots made a move toward world domination, she'd be prepared to stop them. And maybe meet a girl like Linda Hamilton along the way.

Santana blinked a few times, not really sure why the other girl's eyes just went a little glassy and she seemed to be day dreaming.

"I don't trust 'em, that's all," Santana answered, snapping the girl out of her reverie. "Kinda pegged you more as a Sarah Connor than a Miles Dyson. But, y'know, to each her own, I guess."

Quinn blinked, her eyes snapping to meet the other girl's gaze. Santana Lopez referencing a Terminator movie? Now that was unexpected.

"Anyway, other than Rachel Berry, what else do have for me, squint?"

The other girl bit her tongue at the nickname. Somehow she didn't think it would do her any favors to tell Santana that she also thought Angela Montenegro from _Bones_ was hot. "What about Kitty? She's a junior, but – "

"But nothing. Pass on account of inherent evilness."

"She's not evil," Quinn defended half-heartedly.

"Don't know how that girl doesn't have a scar on her chest. Doesn't demon skin melt when a cross touches it?"

The other girl just barely stifled her giggle. It was true, Kitty was 99% claws.

"Well, I don't know how you'd feel about this but, Marley Rose certainly fits your criteria. She's quite beautiful, very bright, can dance …" Quinn trailed off and sighed. "But she's really sweet and kind of naive, so maybe she's not a good choice."

"You think I can't do sweet?" Santana asked with a frown.

"I didn't mean," the other girl shook her head and tried to explain. "She's a really nice girl and she just always sees the good in people, you know? So, if you ask her, I guess I'm just saying to keep all that in mind because it would suck if she got hurt."

"Wouldn't ask her anyway," Santana informed the other girl. "I don't get the hat thing."

"I like her hats."

"Maybe you should ask Marley, then. You know, since you like her so much." Was this how Santana wanted the conversation to end - with the girl she was about to invite to prom asking someone else? She's not really sure how they got there but she was pretty sure this wasn't going to end up going her way.

Quinn shook her head and quickly said, "Oh, no. No no. I like Marley but," she paused in an effort to choose her words carefully, "she's kind of a home body, you know? Not a lot of adventure in her, I guess. And, honestly, I think she only dates boys."

"Then why did you suggest her if she only dates boys?"

"Because I'm pretty sure there doesn't exist a girl at this school who wouldn't go out with you. Gay, straight or anywhere in between."

Santana's eyes narrowed as she considered the other girl's words. "What about you? How come you're not on the list of potentials for me?"

"Me?" Quinn's eyes widened and she blinked owlishly at Santana. "Because I don't fit your standards?" she guessed before turning her attention back to the monitor and scrolling through the names, again.

Santana took a moment to look at her – and she didn't make any effort to hide the fact that she was looking at Quinn. "Pretty sure you do, Q," she finally said.

"Sure, I do. And it's Quinn," the other girl replied with a shake of her head. "I've never been accused of being pretty before. And no, Artie doesn't count because he thinks any girl who speaks to him is pretty."

"Didn't say pretty," Santana argued. She tapped her finger on the page and, when Quinn's eyes drifted down to read the word she was pointing to, she gave the other girl a little wink. "You don't give yourself enough credit, I think. You totes got potential, you know."

"I don't need potential," Quinn said defensively. "This is who I am. So, unless you like glasses and unruly hair, then I suggest you review your definition of gorgeous."

Santana smirked. "Never said I didn't like those things. Which brings us to items two through four. Smart, check. Can dance, check."

"You've never seen me dance."

"Nope, but I've seen you sword fight," Santana admits. "And your little nerd brigade co-leader, Blaine of the Gel Tribe, told me that you've got him learning fight sequences from Kill Bill."

Quinn grimaced and inhaled through her teeth. "Don't tell him, but he really needs to stick to the Matrix choreography. He doesn't really have the gymnastics background to do the Kill Bill sequence."

"Gymnastics, huh?" There was a gleam in Santana's eyes as the girl looked Quinn up and down. The other girl could only answer with a roll of her eyes. "Okay, so, item four – the unexpected."

There were no words that could express Quinn's thoughts better than a loud, short burst of laughter. Santana Lopez showing up with the former Queer Freakbray to prom? That idea was born and bred in the land of the unexpected.

"Funny thing is," Santana began with a soft smile. "Nothing you've said has sounded like a _no_."

"Funny thing is," Quinn countered, "nothing you've said sounded like you were really asking me."

"So, it's a date, then," the other girl announced.

Quinn rolled her eyes and shoved the other girl's arm. "Quit messing around, Santana."

"I'm not. I came in here to ask you to prom," Santana replied. "You're the one who decided to try to find me dates with girls who are, by the way, complete unacceptable suggestions. If you turn me down, it'll only solidify what my gut's telling me."

The other girl furrowed her brows and stared at her.

"That your taste in girls sucks."

"It's crazy, you know that? You asking me to go with you? It's certifiable."

"Still doesn't sound like a _no_."

Quinn pulled her bottom lip between her teeth as she thought about it. She didn't _want_ to say no. She just thought that maybe she _should_.

"I'll take your silence as a _yes_, then." Santana pushed out of the chair and stepped behind Quinn. She bent down so that her lips brushed the other girl's ear when she whispered, "Thanks for your help, Q"

Quinn watched the other girl leave, her cheer skirt swaying as she walked, and almost voicelessly said, "… any time."


	2. Tuesday: Safe Spaces

_Title: Safe Spaces  
Pairing: Quinntana  
Prompt: Serial Killer_

_A/N: _

_Given the prompt, people will be dying. And also probably some potty words in the form of eff bombs and the like. _

_One bit I actually had to look up for realism (to make sure it was even possible). It is in the right circumstances. As I'm not a serial killer (or any type of killer or psycho), I ask for a little suspension of reality in case it's not 100% possible the way the "motel" victim goes down. _

The clack of her heels echoed through the empty hallway. It was still dark and most of the kids who would soon be clogging the halls were still sleeping. The smell of bleach hung in the air, not yet wiped away by the bodies that would alter it with perfume, fast food breakfasts and the unforgettable "fresh from football practice" scent.

If Quinn Fabray had to be in school, this was her preferred time of day.

With no one else around, she didn't have to try so hard to hide her animosity – for other students or for her teachers. She was free to pass the trophy case and sneer at Coach Sylvester's photo without having to explain, once again, the difference between quitting and being kicked off the squad. She could stare daggers at Finn Hudson's locker without being on the receiving end of a pep talk that boiled down to "there's other fish in the sea."

She didn't want Finn to be a fish on her hook. Well, she might but not in the way her friends believed.

Her hatred of Finn Hudson, contrary to popular belief, was not centered on his quick exit from their relationship to date Rachel Berry. It wasn't even about his quick exit from his relationship with Rachel Berry for another girl. Quinn couldn't have cared less who the boy was dating. What she did care about was how he handled being turned down by her best friend, Santana Lopez.

Santana was Quinn's person. She was the only person who got her and didn't push her to accept with a smile the crap that people dished out. Santana didn't care if Quinn didn't like someone because, odds were, Santana didn't like that person either. Quinn took comfort knowing that not everyone she knew was a sheep and that she wasn't the only wolf pretending to fit in.

They were a pack of two.

Quinn knew it was hard enough for Santana to fit in without some Neanderthal pulling a stunt like the one Finn pulled. So what if every other girl fell for his boyish, puppy-dog charm? So what if Santana continuously ignored his attention and, eventually, all-out rejected him in front of his team mates?

Outing her to save face and subjecting her to the ridicule and ruthless taunts of their peers was perhaps the harshest punishment Finn could have given her. Instead of taking it like a man, he announced that he knew why Santana wouldn't go out with him and joked that maybe she should quit Cheerios and join the golf team. By the time he was done, he made certain that everyone knew, in no uncertain terms, what Santana was and that it was unacceptable.

When Quinn confronted him, Finn laughed it off. What did he care if the girl who dismissed him was getting the loser treatment? She deserved the name calling, the slushies and everything else that was being doled out. If she had cared about that before she humiliated him by uttering the one word he wasn't supposed to hear from a girl – no – then it wouldn't have ended up being a problem.

Quinn stopped in front of Finn's locker and, when it opened, her upper lip pulled back in disgust. The scent of dirty gym clothes, half-eaten protein bars and Axe body spray wafted out. She pulled her purse open and grabbed a protein bar, the same brand as the ones currently littering Finn's locker. After opening it and taking a bite, she laid it in plain sight on top of his seemingly unused textbooks, swiped the other protein bars and closed the locker.

She was making her second entrance of the day when she heard the commotion. Next to her, Santana's eyes were wide as she was jostled into Quinn when students pushed past them to see what was going on. Following the crowd, they found themselves part of a large group circling Finn Hudson. Quinn pushed her way through and held onto Finn's arms.

"Are you okay?" she asked with what sounded like genuine concern.

Finn shook his head, his eyes round with panic. As his knees buckled, she helped him to the floor and called over her shoulder to get the school nurse.

Pulling the protein bar wrapper from his hands, she made a soft clicking sound with her tongue. "Peanuts?" She leaned close to his ear and sweetly whispered, "You should be more careful about what you put in your mouth."

She drew back far enough to look into his eyes and added, her voice cold and hard, "And what you let come out of it."

Word spread quickly but not quickly enough for the nurse to get to Finn with an epi pen.

Finn Hudson died in front of his locker and all because he grabbed the wrong protein bar at the snack shack. How a boy who had such a deadly allergy to peanuts could overlook buying the chocolate peanut flavor instead of his usual triple chocolate was a mystery.

Everyone was talking about it and a grief counselor was brought in for those who were having a hard time mourning the popular boy. Santana surprised Quinn by telling her that she was considering making an appointment with the counselor - not because of grief but because she didn't know how to reconcile her hatred for him and the fact that he was dead.

In the end, Santana settled for curling up with Quinn and letting the other girl play with her hair while she told her everything she hated about Finn – words, she was sure, would have had a counselor calling her parents for some sort of psycho-babble bullshit intervention. It's not like she could admit to wishing the boy was dead – especially not even forty-eight hours after he dropped to his knees in the hallway. She didn't want to end up on meds, not after seeing how it messed with Quinn's head to be on them.

That didn't mean that Santana didn't think the world of Quinn. Just because the girl was damaged didn't mean she didn't hang the moon. It's just that, while she was hanging the moon, the girl had to stop and take a couple of pills in order to prevent herself from performing a perfect swan dive back to earth.

Quinn was the only person Santana trusted with all of her secrets – almost all. Before Finn announced it to the masses, only Quinn knew what Santana had finally worked out for herself. Did Santana tell Quinn the identity of the girl who had her questioning her sexuality? Not exactly. But she just couldn't risk adding more to Quinn's already fully medicated plate and losing her entirely.

She felt badly running to Quinn every time her world seemed to be crumbling down. Quinn had enough of her own baggage to carry; she didn't need anyone else's. But Santana couldn't help it – Quinn was her safe place.

The night Santana's grandmother, the woman she most looked up to, turned her out of the house for the sin of being honest and true to herself, Santana once again found herself in tears in the other girl's room. Quinn curled herself protectively around her best friend, filtering the girl's hair through her fingers and whispered over and over again that it would be okay.

Quinn tried. She tried really hard to make it okay.

She went to the Santana's grandmother's house and pled with the old lady to reconsider her stance, to reach out to her granddaughter and welcome her back into her home. Quinn kept her voice calm as she questioned the woman about unconditional love and kept her face neutral when the old woman spoke of the sin of selfishness. When the lecture was over, Quinn blew out a long breath and asked if she could visit the bathroom before making the long drive back to her house.

She stared at herself in the mirror for a long moment. How could she not have been able to fix this? She scowled at herself in disgust – some protector she was. Her best friend, the person she loved the most, was hurting and, once again, she was powerless to stop it. After a hard blink, she swiped the back of her hand over her eyes and inhaled deeply, centering herself.

She pulled her medication out of her pocket and held the bottle up to the light, squinting at it. She would come up short but if she got the right pharmacist, she might be able to get her refill a few days early. If not – she'd just do what she had to do.

Quinn searched the medicine cabinet for the right bottle. She'd gone with Santana a couple of times to pick up her grandmother's prescriptions. There were a few for heart disease and – Quinn bit her lip when she found the indomethacin, the old lady's arthritis pills. She read the label, noting how small the dosages was, and popped open the cap to look inside. Just as she remembered – little green capsules.

After capping the bottle, Quinn opened the pill box that rested on the counter and removed the green pills. She threw them in the toilet and replaced them with the green capsules from her own bottle. The dosage of her own pills far surpassed the ones she switched out.

Quinn made sure everything was where it was supposed to be before flushing the toilet and washing her hands, her eyes carefully avoiding the mirror.

She nodded solemnly, ever the dutiful friend, when she heard the news that Santana's grandmother had suffered heart failure. The family was in shock because the old woman was vigilant about taking her medications. But Quinn knew better.

Quinn knew that the woman's heart had failed long before the night she was discovered passed out in her bathroom. Her heart failed when she turned her back on her granddaughter and broke _her_ heart. It was only a matter of time before it caught up with her.

That Saturday, Santana held her hand as they entered the pharmacy to refill Quinn's Prozac prescription. The pharmacist questioned Quinn about the near week's doses she should have still had and Quinn made up something about dropping them on the floor and not being the kind of girl who believes in the two-second rule.

He refused to refill her prescription until the date indicated on her bottle, but still reminded the girl of the side effects and warnings that came with Prozac: everything from dry mouth and dizziness to nightmares and abnormal heart rhythms. Santana frowned at the last item, a sudden worry resting heavy in her chest.

"Are you coming to the funeral?" Santana asked, her head pillowed against the other girl's arm.

Quinn played with the ends of the other girl's hair and whispered, "If you want me to."

Santana nodded softly. "My entire family's coming and," she let out a small breath, "and I know they blame me because of what I told her …"

The other girl sat up quickly, frowning. "Your grandmother's death isn't your fault, Santana. And anyone who says that is as heartless as she was."

"She wasn't heartless, Q."

"She hurt you."

Santana tugged on her best friend's arm, trying to get her to lie down again, and admitted, "I don't think anyone's ever hurt me like that before. I trusted her. She was supposed to love me no matter what – she always said she would."

"I'm sorry," Quinn whispered before dropping a kiss against Santana's hair. "I would give anything to have been able to stop it from happening."

Perhaps that was Quinn's greatest regret – never being able to stop the hurt. She wanted to protect Santana but she never seemed able. She tried to fix it after the fact but that never worked out either. All she could do was punish the person who hurt her best friend - after the damage was already done.

Quinn thought she might be given another chance when she joined Santana's family at the repast after the funeral. She was surprised at how light the gathering seemed following such a solemn ceremony. Santana's younger cousins ran around the house in their best church clothes, laughing and playing, while the adults raised their glasses and swapped family stories as though they'd never heard them before. She sat with Santana on the stairs and watched the affair from their own little corner of the universe.

"You okay?" her best friend asked, her mouth pulled into a concerned frown.

Quinn nodded softly but didn't answer.

"You sure? Because you don't look so good. I mean," Santana backtracked, "you always look good, Q. But, you look like you're in pain or something."

"It's just a little headache," Quinn whispered. "It's fine. Nothing I can't handle."

Santana wanted to question her further but she knew better. Her best friend was strong and, even when she wasn't, she didn't want anyone to know. It was a pride thing for Quinn. So, instead of putting her friend on the spot and asking if she needed her pills – Santana didn't even know if she'd gotten the refill yet – she simply nodded and gave her friend a half-smile.

"Get outta the way," a deep voice boomed harshly above them.

Quinn clenched her eyes closed tightly and set her jaw. Santana noticed and scooted closer, giving her uncle – Jorge – enough room to pass. He didn't notice the way the other girl bent over and pressed her face into his niece's shoulder. All he saw was the way Santana gently rubbed her back and he scowled as he stomped down the stairs.

Two days later, it wasn't his face that Quinn recognized, but the harsh bass of his voice as he yelled at Santana in the school parking lot. He had his niece backed up against his rental car, his finger in her face as he screamed at her.

Quinn didn't know if her heart was beating so fast because she knew this was her moment to finally do what she promised herself she would always do for Santana – protect her – or if was just a side-effect from missing another dose of her medication. She tried to get her legs to move faster but everything slowed, even the man's shouts were reaching her as though she was under water. And when she saw his hand rise – everything stopped.

It wasn't the kind of hit Santana was used to. She was no stranger to the stinging slap of a teenage girl scorned. But this was different. This was the blunt-force punch of an angry man looking for revenge. This was every ounce of rage that could be held in one man's hand and delivered with the force of bitterness and hatred. It brought the girl to her knees, her cheek cradled in her hands as her uncle stepped over her, jumped into his car and, with tires squealing, peeled out of the parking lot.

Santana barely understood the apology Quinn repeated like a mantra as she was half-carried and half-dragged to her best friend's car. She found it so difficult to grasp the words Quinn angrily pushed out through tears that for a brief moment, even though her eye was pulsing and her cheek felt like it was on fire, Santana wondered if her uncle hit her ear. She pressed her face against the cool window and closed her eyes, trying to untangle the apologies from the threats.

She woke up to the sounds of Alex Trebek offering a Daily Double and Quinn mumbling under her breath as she paced in front of the television. If the pain she felt hadn't clued her in, then the bag of frozen peas on her face made it clear that she hadn't dreamed her earlier altercation with her uncle.

"Q," she croaked sleepily. "Fuck's sake, stop. You're makin' me dizzy."

Her best friend turned, eyes wide, and took three large steps until she was sitting on the couch beside Santana. Quinn opened her mouth but couldn't bring herself to speak. What could she say – that she was sorry for letting Santana down _again_?

Santana frowned and reached for her friend's hand. "Jesus, _I_ got punched in the face. Why do you look like shit?"

Quinn sniffled and shook her head stubbornly, not trusting herself to respond.

"I'm alright, ya' big baby," Santana teased, the eye that wasn't covered fought to catch her friend's gaze but the girl refused to look at her. "Hey," she said more gently, threading her fingers through Quinn's, "Your bag o'peas trick is totally working."

Quinn inhaled deeply and with an eerily calm voice replied, "I'm sorry you need them."

Santana's stomach tightened. It'd been a long time since she heard that tone. Not since before the girl quit cheerleading. Not since before she'd dyed her hair pink and started smoking. And not again since she was forced to get her head shrunk on a weekly basis and told to start taking pills.

"Q?"

"You think it's okay to drive you home?" Quinn asked evenly. "I didn't want to risk him being there."

Santana blinked a few times. "Uh, no. He's staying at the motel. So, home's fine - unless you want me to stay with you," she offered. "We can beat these punks at Final Jeopardy."

The other girl shook her head. "I have to run some errands. Get my pills and stuff." Quinn knew that was the one excuse – her medication – that Santana would never argue with.

"I can go with you," Santana tried. "We can give the pharmacist the stink-eye when he does that tongue clicking thing before he reads you the side-effects, again." She clicked her tongue and then wrinkled her nose in annoyance. "What do you say?"

Quinn simply shook her head. "You should rest."

And that was the end of the conversation. Santana knew that when Quinn shut down, there was no way to get through until the girl was ready to let her in, again. She didn't blame her, really. It had been a long time since Quinn had to deal with anything on her own - since she had to face anything without pharmaceutical back-up.

Quinn didn't stick around to help explain to Santana's parents what happened. She knew her friend could handle it and, once that was done, it would mean that she had less time to complete her _errand_. There was no doubt that Mr. Lopez would go after his brother-in-law.

She worried she would have to wait – but the thought of that man getting to rest comfortably in his room and enjoy free cable stabbed at her last nerve.

Not that Quinn believed in luck, but if she did, then she most certainly would have thought it was on her side. Not two minutes after pulling her car into the parking lot, Jorge stalked to the ice machine at the end of the row of rooms and filled his bucket. Quinn's upper lip curled back when she saw him shove his hand into the bucket, icing his knuckles, on the way back to the room.

She gave him a moment after closing the door before getting out of her car and knocking on his door. The sliding of the chain lock let her know that Jorge was expecting trouble. But when he caught sight of a girl in a baby-doll dress and short sweater, she had to force herself not to smirk at the way he immediately relaxed.

Quinn didn't think it would be so easy to get into the motel room. Pretending to be meeting her boyfriend and acting as though she just realized she'd been stood up seemed to do the trick. With nothing more than a quick age check, Jorge invited her in for a drink and to commiserate on the unfairness of life. He stuck her with the beer while he nursed a bottle of tequila.

She grew anxious the more he talked and her eyes kept flitting to the alarm clock on the bedside table. Quinn wondered how much time she had before Santana's father showed up to defend his daughter – how much time was left before her plan was ruined.

It didn't help that he drank as much as he talked. He ranted about his mother's death between swigs from his bottle and vented about his no-good-selfish-bitch of a niece. The girl, he firmly believe, killed his mother.

Quinn's hands clenched under the kitchenette table, her nails digging into her palms, as Jorge continued to blame Santana for the old lady's death. Claiming she died of a broken heart? It was broken, all right; but, Santana didn't do it. Her best friend had shown that woman nothing but love and respect and this is what she gets for it – a punch in the face and blind rage aimed at her?

She needed a break. Her head was pounding, the beer she was nursing was making her thirsty and she found the way her heart was beating in her ears very distracting. Much more of this, coupled his raving about her best friend was going to lead her to do something stupid, something premature and rash. Every spiteful word from his mouth was pushing her closer to her breaking point.

So, when a shrill sound pulled her attention to Jorge's cell phone, Quinn's belief in luck started to grow. He grimaced at the name on the caller ID, swiped his bottle of "harder stuff" and excused himself to taken the call in the bathroom.

Quinn listened carefully, trying to piece together the conversation. It was, without a doubt, her best friend's father. Santana's father wasn't coming to punish the man who hurt his daughter? Luck really was on her side. He was going to let his brother-in-law off with an angry phone call?

After the phone call, Jorge was more relaxed. He almost seemed smug, as though he'd gotten away with something. Quinn took this as her opportunity.

She giggled and flirted with him. She teased him about how much her boyfriend could drink and smirked when he took the bait and downed gulps of the liquor he'd been nursing all night. It was only a matter of time before it happened, before he was loose enough to proposition the girl who happened upon his doorstep.

Quinn bit back her disgust and played along, giggling and tucking her hair behind her ear. How the man ever got any with a line as crude as "maybe you could give me a hand" was a mystery to Quinn. He didn't need to know that she had no intention of anything of the sort when visiting the motel that evening.

Needing to get to the sink, Quinn told him that she should wash her hands first. Jorge found it endearing and, in a way that Quinn found entirely too condescending, _cute_. He followed her to the kitchen and stood too close as she washed her hands. As she rinsed the soap off, she gasped and told him that she lost her mother's ring down the drain.

She gave Jorge a sob story her mother dying (Judy was home and most likely sitting down to watch _Grey's Anatomy_) and his heart went out to her, his pain still so fresh from the loss of his own mother. In his drunken stupor, he shoved his hand into the drain and felt around for a ring.

Quinn took a deep breath, steeling herself for what she knew she had to do and grabbed the back of his head. With a swift downward motion, she smashed his forehead into the counter and turned on the disposal. That would teach him to ever lay a finger on her best friend.

But he had seen her.

She couldn't just leave him there, his fingers a tangled, bloody mess. He'd seen her and, even though he'd had nearly an entire bottle of tequila, she couldn't chance that he'd remember anything. Quinn hit the switch and the disposal stopped, freeing his hand so that he slumped unconscious on the kitchenette floor.

Quinn didn't see another choice. She took off the necklace that hung around his neck and threw it in the sink before breaking his bottle against the counter. With his fingers wrapped around one of the largest pieces, Quinn forced him to saw against the skin at his wrist. This was what her parents were afraid she knew how to do – this motion. This is why she was took the pills.

How would they react if they found out that the pills only stopped her from doing it to herself? It didn't matter. There was enough blood flowing from Jorge's wrist to indicate to Quinn that she'd done what she needed to do.

He was no longer a threat.

She didn't let Santana down, again.

But luck didn't exist. Or, if it did, it wasn't the friend Quinn thought it was.

After washing her hands and making sure she looked presentable, Quinn crept out of Jorge's motel room. In her rush to get to her car, she failed to notice eyes, narrowed in confusion, watching her pull out of the parking lot.

Santana stared at the rear lights of her best friend's car as it sped away. She knew why she was there – to confront her uncle – but why was Quinn there? What business could she have had at the motel? It's not like her friend had any clandestine affairs. Santana would have known about something like that. Quinn told her everything. Absolutely everything.

Citing an emergency, Santana got the manager to open Jorge's room. One look at the red stains around her uncle's body sent the girl running outside, gasping for fresh air. The manager walked up behind her, offered his condolences and told her that losing someone to suicide is never easy. Before leaving to call the police, he held up the necklace he'd found in the sink and told her that it was probably what he was after when he got his fingers torn up in the sink.

When Santana closed her eyes, she didn't see her uncle on the floor – she saw Quinn, hastily escaping. She didn't mention it to the police. How could she? Quinn was her safe space.

When Quinn awoke the next morning, Santana was standing over her, staring at her as though she'd never seen her before. Rubbing her eyes, Quinn blinked a few times, tilted her head and reached out her hand.

But Santana didn't take it.

"Q, tell me you didn't do what I think you did," she said, her voice wavering. Quinn couldn't tell if Santana was mad or afraid. No matter – she didn't like the way it unsettled her stomach.

"What you think I did?" Quinn asked innocently. "I don't know what you mean."

"Jorge. Tell me I didn't see you coming out of his room last night," Santana's voice was pleading. "If you tell me you didn't do it, I'll believe you."

Quinn bit her lip and looked away.

"Quinn," her best friend warned. "Tell me you didn't do it. Just _say_ you didn't, okay?"

She shook her head and whispered, "I promised you that I'd never lie to you, San."

The other girl's knees weakened and she fell into a sitting position on her friend's bed. "How could you do that? How could you do that to a person, Q? And just, what? Come home and take a nap?" Angry tears rolled down Santana's cheeks. "What's wrong with you?"

"I did it. I promised I would and I did," Quinn explained. "For you. He'll never hurt you again. Don't you get it? No one's allowed to hurt you."

Santana's eyes widened and she whispered, "Are you listening to yourself, Q? Can you hear how crazy you sound?"

"I'm not crazy!" Quinn shouted, throwing the covers off and jumping out of bed. The corner of her mouth pulled down and her chin quivered as she asked, "How can you say that when all I've done is try to protect you?"

"Protect me," Santana echoed slowly, not sure how the other girl's actions could be considered protective.

"Will he ever lay a hand on you again? No." Quinn shook her head emphatically. "He hurt you and it wasn't right for him to act like it was okay."

"So you get someone to punch him in the face, Q! That's _justice_! You don't – " the other girl stopped and let out a defeated breath. "He was my uncle. Do you get that? Do you get that you took away any chance I had to change his mind about me. I'll never get that now, Quinn. I'll never get to have my say. Do you get that?"

Quinn's brows furrowed in confusion.

"It's like my grandmother's death all over again, Q. She hated me when she died and I'll never get the chance to fix that," Santana explained. "Now I'll always remember her as hating me."

The other girl swallowed roughly and blinked rapidly as though trying to take in her friend's words. "But she broke your heart," was all she could say, her voice a rough whisper.

"Not getting to show her that she was wrong about me – about who I am –and not getting to see her look at me like she did before I told her – that breaks my heart," Santana informed her friend.

The other girl sat heavily on her bed, trying to figure out what was going on. Something wasn't right.

Santana was supposed to feel safe. She was supposed to let Quinn hold her and play with her hair. She was supposed to let Quinn kiss her hair and promise to make everything better. For a brief moment, Quinn thought that she maybe was wrong. Maybe Santana didn't get her.

"I'm not going to tell anyone, Q," Santana finally said after a long moment of watching the other girl think. She could practically see the wheels turning in her friend's head. "My family already blames me for my grandmother's heart attack. I can't drag them through something like this and prove that they were right."

"You were confused, okay? Maybe you didn't go there for _that_," she continued, trying to talk herself into find a way to make the situation okay. "You went there to talk to him, right? And he did something, I don't know what and I don't care, but you got scared and things just got out of control. It was an accident and, it just kind of ending up looking like he killed himself. That's what happened," she finished with a tone of finality.

Quinn, with her eyes trained on her bedspread, simply nodded. Her brain was moving too fast to come up with a story that would appease her best friend. And she didn't want to lie to Santana, anyway. She was supposed to be the one who would never hurt her. Quinn was Santana's safe place.

"You should go," Quinn said without looking up.

"Q – "

"You shouldn't be here with me," the girl said, finally looking up with a detached gaze.

"I'm not leaving," Santana answered firmly, fear sitting heavily in the pit of her stomach. "What are you going to do?"

The other girl sighed. "Just take my meds, get a shower and," she paused and stared at herself in the vanity mirror behind her best friend, "and I don't know."

"I'll wait here," Santana said. It wasn't an offer – Quinn knew that much. She knew from the softness of the girl's eyes – the same ones that were only moments before looking at her with dread –her best friend was worried, and she didn't trust her.

Quinn inhaled deeply and stepped in front of the other girl. "I know it doesn't matter but, I did it for you, Santana." With a long exhale, she looked into Santana eyes and admitted, "You're the reason for everything I do and I would _never_ hurt you on purpose. There isn't anything I wouldn't do for you or anyone I wouldn't try to stop from hurting you. I love you _that_ much," Quinn stated evenly.

Santana's heart froze in her chest. She'd wanted for so long to hear Quinn say that she loved her. All of those times Quinn held her and played with her hair, Santana wished she'd say it. But not like this. Not with a voice devoid of emotion. Not with an empty gaze locked on her own.

The second Quinn shut the door to her en suite bathroom, Santana began her search. She wasn't sure what she was looking for but there had to be something in her friend's room that would give her a clue. There had to be something that would prepare her for whatever Quinn was going to do next.

She upended drawers, rifled through Quinn's neatly stacked papers and even crawled under the girl's bed. When Santana leaned her back against the bed, her fingers suddenly felt cold around the composition book she held in a death grip. It was _the special one_ that Quinn was supposed to bring to her therapy sessions but always told her doctor she forgot.

_Finn gives away someone else's secrets, pairs them with lies and propaganda, and he's still a hero. He's still loved. And the person who deserves love the most is _vilified_. He won't listen to reason. He can't see past his ego to do what is right – to make things right. I want nothing more than to take his hateful words, shove them in his mouth and make him choke on them for what he's done to her. _

Santana's chest tightened, making her already loudly pounding heartbeat reverberate into her hears. There was nothing before that entry except a few drawings of flowers and trees.

_Why can't I do this? I try so hard and fail – every, single time. Will I always be too late to keep pain from finding her? When you love someone, you move mountains for them. You go to the end of the earth. You do things you never thought you could do. You let yourself get lost in them. That's love. And I know I love her enough to do those things. So, why can't I get it right?_

The shower turning on in the bathroom pulled Santana's attention away from the journal. She had no idea – none – that her best friend felt like this. She just thought Quinn was over-protective because Santana stood by her when so many others walked away. Who wouldn't hold so tightly to the one constant in her life?

_The pedestal she was placed upon is too high for her to see the pain she's inflicting on someone who loves her so dearly. Or maybe she does see it, but her chest is too empty with no heart inside it to prompt her to care. She must be heartless to act as she has when she's been shown nothing but love and respect. Her parts must be broken not to ache for the hurt that I can so clearly see with every tear I wipe away. I know what it means for me, but a few days on my own – without a crutch – will be okay. I can be strong enough for her. _

Santana's mind swirled with thoughts. It almost too much for her to make sense of: Finn's throat, her grandmother's heart. Had she not just read rationales for their deaths, Santana would have forever believed that these deaths were accidental. Finn's throat didn't close up because of an oversight when choosing his breakfast. Her grandmother's heart failure was from what? She re-read the passage, her brows pushed together tightly, a crease forming between them.

She closed her eyes and let out a deep breath at the realization. "Dammit, Quinn," she whispered to no one. How careless the girl was to put her own well-being on the line for revenge. Santana felt guilty a moment later for worrying about Quinn's health when it was the same girl's fault that her grandmother was dead.

She flipped a few pages, skipping more sketches of leaves and - Santana's nose wrinkled - she wasn't really sure but it looked like a weeping willow or whatever those trees with the dangling branches were called.

A graphite feather decorated the last page that held writing. Santana squinted as she tried to make sense of the scribbled words. Unlike the other passages, this one was a jumble of words with no structure. It was as though Quinn just opened her brain and let her thoughts fall as they may onto the page.

_i was supposed to catch her his hands are big so completely failed she fell and i wasn't there to catch her and his voice is so loud that I don't know how my head didn't split open i hate him for what he's done why can't i do this _no one _is allowed to hurt her no one ever i wont let them_

Santana knew what that was. She used her fingers to count backward from her grandmother's death to - the incident with her uncle. Quinn's was on too high of a dosage of her anti-depressant to have been off of it for that long. It was a wonder the girl had the willpower to pull herself out of bed to brush her hair, let alone to carry out the deeds she had.

And for what? To prove something that didn't need proving – that she was Santana safe place?

She was back on her pills, though. Quinn said as much before leaving to get into the shower. She was on her pills, thinking more clearly. Her anxiety should have been gone and she should have been Quinn again.

But she wasn't. Quinn didn't look at her with empty eyes or speak to her in flat tones. The girl wasn't right yet and when she wasn't right, she did stupid, crazy things. Santana held a book with proof of it. The problem was that Santana didn't know what Quinn was going to do next.

It's not like she could think like Quinn. She couldn't put herself in the shoes of a girl who would do what Quinn had done. She couldn't think like a girl who sat silently in therapy every week and watched the second hand tick until she was told she could go. She couldn't imagine what a girl who relied on pills to keep her demons at bay could be thinking.

Taking a deep breath, Santana closed her eyes, clutching the book to her chest, and tried to consider Quinn's options. She tried not to let the ends Quinn used to justify her means get in the way of putting the puzzle together. The means were too unreal for Santana to grasp, even if the end wasn't: love, providing safety. She could understand that. It's nothing she didn't want to provide for Quinn – she just never considered bringing it to such extremes.

Quinn's ultimate goal was to protect Santana, to get rid anyone who would hurt her. The list of people and their crimes ticked in her mind: Finn and his words, her grandmother and her conditional love, her uncle and his angry fist. They all hurt Santana and, because of that, Quinn saw it to it that they paid the price.

It took only as long as necessary for that thought to fully form in her mind before Santana figured it out.

Like a shot, Santana was on her feet and banging on the bathroom door. "Open up, Quinn!" When she received no answer, she kicked the door and shouted, "I'm not fucking around, Quinn. Open the goddamned door or I swear to God I'll break it down!"

The shower didn't turn off, the door didn't open and Santana received no reply.

Santana smacked the door in frustration before even thinking to try the handle. As she pushed the door open, she silently thanked Quinn's parents for removing the interior door locks after the girl's last _episode_. "Dammit Q!"

Quinn was staring, wide-eyed at herself in the full-length mirror, an open bottle in her hand.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Santana yelled in her face before slapping the bottle away. Less than a handful of pills spilled onto the floor. She grabbed Quinn's shoulders and shook her. "How can you be so stupid?"

The other girl blinked but her gaze didn't leave the reflection in the mirror.

"You don't know anything about love," Santana accused her. "This isn't love! You don't love me!"

That got Quinn's attention. Her eyes snapped to Santana's and she clenched her jaw as she curled her arm over her stomach.

"If you loved me, you wouldn't be running away right now, like a coward." Santana's narrowed eyes bored into Quinn's. "You wouldn't be trying to _hurt me _like this. If you loved me, your fingers would be down your throat and you'd be fixing this shit."

Quinn shook her head and apologetically whispered, "_No one's_ allowed to hurt you, San."

"Then don't!" The other girl all but dragged Quinn toward the toilet and hauled her to her knees. When her friend didn't make a move, she slammed the seat against the tank and pushed Quinn over the open bowl. "If you don't do it, I swear to God I'm next. I'm not sticking around if you did all of that and you _don't _love me."

Quinn didn't do anything to rectify the situation, her arm still bent protectively over her stomach.

Santana curled herself over Quinn's back and pressed her lips to the other girl's ear. "What should it be? Pills, like you? Slit my wrists like, my uncle? I bet it wouldn't take me long to find your dad's gun. Closet, you think? Or maybe a good ol' hanging is more my style?"

"You can't."

Placing a kiss on the skin behind Quinn's ear, Santana said, "I can do anything you can do, Quinn Fabray. You wanna call my bluff? You think you can stop me if you're dead?"

Quinn whimpered softly and her shoulder's slumped. "Just let me go," she said, her voice nothing more than a rough whisper.

"If you go, I go with you, Q," the other girl promised. "I've lost too many people I love. So, if you're leaving, too, then I'm gonna follow you. _That's_ what love is. It's following someone so they don't get lost. And if they do - it's finding them."

Santana slid to the floor facing her friend and held Quinn's face in her hands. "If you don't let me find you, then you're forcing me to follow you. Do you understand that?" She searched her friend's eyes.

Quinn blinked a few times, tears spilling over her cheeks and onto the other girl's fingers. She tenderly placed her hands on Santana's shoulders and answered the girl with a sharp push. Santana fell backward just before her friend forced herself to empty her stomach into the waiting bowl.

"Grossest _I love you, too _ever, Q," the other girl said, kneeling next to her friend and rubbing her back. "But I am so glad to hear it."

After what felt like an hour of listening to Quinn cough up the pills she'd taken – in reality it'd only been closer to five minutes – Santana pulled the other girl into her and leaned back against the tub. She curled herself around Quinn and played with her hair.

"I'm not gonna tell, Q," she promised, dropping a kiss against the top of Quinn's head. "I won't let them take you away. I won't let anything happen, okay?"

Quinn nodded silently, her chin pressing into the arm Santana wound around her to hold her close.

"This is ours, okay? Just you and me," Santana continued, her promises spilling out easily. "I'll keep you safe."


	3. Wed: Pierce Family Traditional Drink

**_Title_**_: The Pierce Family Traditional Drink__  
_**_Author_**_: headcannon__  
_**_Pairing_**_: Quinntana__  
_**_Prompt_**_: Body Swap  
__**Note: **__I seriously couldn't come up with a title. I almost used "Donkey Face and the Hobbit. Totes." As a joke title; but … anyway, if I come up with something later, I'll change it. _

_ Mostly AU. Very generally based on the show; but, I've removed Brittana angst. I may or may not have stolen some quotes from the show. And by "may or may not," I mean that I did. Stole Brody, too. (It's AU, I can do what I want! Party!)_

_ Also? Little random note that's not important (but also kind of is): lemon juice makes milk curdle. Yum._

"In honor of what may be our last Friday the thirteenth together," Santana began as she filled glasses with ice, "I propose a break from tradition –"

Quinn rolled her eyes, interrupting her friend. "You _always_ propose a break from tradition and we _always_ veto you." She dumped the microwave popcorn into a large bowl before lifting it and cradling it in the crook of her arm.

"So, we're sticking to two traditions," Brittany noted happily as though they were accomplishing something close to a miracle. She poked the puree button on the blender just as Santana opened her mouth to argue. The other girl's newest concoction swirled around in the blender-glass cutting off any argument her friend might have tried to offer.

Their _Freaky Friday the Thirteenth_ tradition began the summer the trio – not yet given the nickname _The Unholdy Trinity_ – met at cheer camp. It was Brittany's idea to celebrate the day with a with a _Friday the 13__th_ slumber party.

Quinn hadn't known when she accepted the invitation that the date was also the name of a movie. When she informed her soon-to-be best friends that her parents didn't allow her to watch horror movies, Santana threw herself backward on Brittany's bed and groaned. Their other friend, however, just smiled and pulled out two DVDs: _Freaky Friday,_ the original with Jodie Foster and the remake with Lindsey Lohan.

"Try this," Brittany said, sliding to Santana a mug with the words _I Like the Nightlife, I love to Boogie_ on it.

"What is it?" the other girl asked nervously.

Santana had been on the receiving end of enough of Brittany's experiments to have learned to ask first.

There was once a shake made from mint chocolate chip ice cream and four cloves of garlic. And there was that time it took a week before she got over the nausea that came from the pureed cottage cheese, beets and graham cracker fiasco. At one point, Quinn didn't talk to Brittany for days after trying a drink that turned out to be apple juice, blueberries, oatmeal flakes and three different kinds of steak sauces.

"In honor of our last official Friday the 13thslumber party," Brittany announced, giving Quinn a Nyan Cat cup, "I've made for you a Peirce family specialty. Once you drink it, you'll be able to see yourself as other people see you."

Quinn rolled her eyes. Brittany's offerings always came imbued with some special powers or insights. She never actually believed any of it to be true but humored the girl by at least taking a little sip. The only power the drinks seemed to have was a stomach-upending power. It took most of her energy to control her gag reflex until Brittany's back was turned and she could make a hasty escape.

"What's in it?" Santana asked warily and then added, "And where's yours?"

Brittany shook her head and replied, "I don't need it. I know how other people see me." She tilted her head and counted off on her fingers, "Totally cute, super talented, really smart and all-around awesome."

Quinn bit her lip to keep herself from laughing. "And we need it because?"

The other girl sighed. "Because you're both going away and you won't have me to tell you, anymore."

With her friends' help, Brittany was able to eke out a grade point average that just barely allowed her to graduate. She didn't care that she wasn't getting honors, like Santana, or giving a big speech, like Quinn. She was walking with her friends and that's what she wanted.

In a way, she felt like she won the battle, but not the war. _The Unholy Trinity _started and finished high school together; but, unlike her two friends, she would be staying in Lima and taking classes at the junior college until she figured out what she wanted to do with her life.

"You skipped the ingredients, Britts," Santana gently said as she tried to not to dwell on the fact that their little trio would be breaking up. "Give it up. What's in here," she prompted, pointing to the mug.

"Vanilla pudding mix, milk, cinnamon …. " Brittany trailed off, as though trying to remember what else she put into the drinks.

Her two friends raised their brows at each other and, having not heard anything that wouldn't go with those ingredients, brought their cups to their lips and drank. They each only got about a swallow and half before a bitter aftertaste covered the cinnamon-crème flavor they only momentarily got to enjoy.

Santana rinsed her mouth out with water and spit it into the sink. "It tastes like the smell of rotten milk!"

"Oh! And lemon juice and cilantro!"

Quinn downed an entire glass of water and then grimaced at her friend as a shudder raced up her spine. "Never again," she vowed. It was the same vow she made at their last sleepover.

"You'll be thanking me when it works," the other girl sing-songed before skipping out of the kitchen. "C'mon, we have to DDR for the bed before we can start the movies."

Yet another tradition.

Brittany slept in a day-bed with a had a pull-out trundle. But that was only room enough for two; so, it was decided that her friends would play Dance Dance Revolution for rights to the extra bed. It was a better idea than having Brittany judge – she wasn't very good at choosing between her two best friends. The one time they tried it that way, Brittany slept on the floor, giving up her own bed rather than make the choice.

Nearly ten hours later, Santana awoke on the floor. They had stayed up later than usual and, in her sleepy haze, she'd forgotten all about her DDR high score and about taunting Quinn with "You suck, Quinn Fabray! I totally won!"

She stretched her arms over her head before dropping her hands to her chest, as she did every morning to greet _the girls_.

Giggles drew her attention to bright blue eyes staring at her. "You're super cute when you pout," Brittany told her. "I've only ever seen you frown before."

Santana stared dumbly at Brittany as the girl poked their sleeping friend in the roll-away bed and announced, "You have to see this! Oh! I should get a camera!"

Quinn snuggled deep under the covers and resisted being awakened. She mumbled, "Too comfy." After another poke, she pushed the covers down with a huff, her eyes narrow slits. "Cut it out, Brittany," she ground out, hardly recognizing her own voice. It sounded crisper, and more annoyed, than usual.

"It worked!" Brittany shouted, kicking her feet free from the covers and running out of the bedroom. She poked her head back in just long enough to say, "You're welcome!"

Santana sat on the floor slack-jawed as she watched herself sit up and rub the sleep from her eyes. She had to admit, she was pretty damned cute when she was sleepy. Except she couldn't be sitting on the bed being cute and sleepy because she was sitting on the floor being confused and – okay - probably still cute. She looked down at herself and moaned, "… so fucked up."

Quinn's hands dropped from her eyes and all of the air was knocked out of her body when she heard her own voice coming from across the room. Her mouth fell open as she looked herself up and down, clearly not able to figure out how her body could be sitting on the floor, staring at her – without her in it.

"Q?" Santana asked, pointing at the girl on the bed. Even if the whole situation didn't make sense, somehow her mind figured out that, if someone was in her body, it would be Quinn.

The other girl nodded before dropping her head into her hands and, like a mantra, repeated, "Wake up, wake up."

Brittany had just found her dad's camera when her two friends came running down the stairs screaming for her. When they caught up with her, she just smiled brightly, held up the camera and took a picture. "Now we'll have evidence!" she stated proudly, holding out the camera so the other could see the preview screen.

Quinn sighed and Santana rolled her eyes at the image. It was a picture of them in their pajamas. Neither felt like explaining that the photo didn't actually prove anything except that Santana slept in a sports tank and boxers. And that wasn't news to anyone.

"You need to make me a de-Quinnifying breakfast smoothie. Like now," Santana said, pushing her friend toward the kitchen. "I don't care if it smells like Finn Hudson and Noah Puckerman had an Axe-off at the garbage dump. You need to fix this."

"I can't."

Santana blinked rapidly, her head tilting and her eyes trained on Brittany. "You what now? You can't?"

"There isn't a Pierce Family anti-traditional drink," the other girl stated simply.

Quinn took a calming breath, trying not to notice how her ample chest rose with the gesture. "How long does it last, B?"

"I don't know," Brittany answered. "I'm pretty sure it's temporary. It's hard to say because I thought that tattoo I got was temporary but it hasn't gone away, yet." She pointed to her wrist where the _Lord Tubbington_ was written in stylized script.

"Maybe you could just make the drink again and we can see if that reverses it," Quinn suggested smartly. "It might put us back where we belong."

"Oh, no. I can't do that," the other girl informed her friends.

"Why the hell not?" Santana crossed her arms and glared at her best friend.

"You made me promise last night to never make you another drink like that again." She shrugged and said, "I promised. What kind of friend would I be if I didn't keep my promises?" Without waiting for a reply, she answered, "A bad one."

Trying to appease her friends, she made them each a peach smoothie. While neither girl thought that their friend really understood the crux of the issue, they couldn't deny their smoothies were much tastier than the previous drinks she'd given them.

After breakfast, Quinn and Santana tried to figure out what they were going to do. Quinn wanted to stay at Brittany's and see if she could talk the girl into making another smoothie (the gross one, not the peach one) and Santana wanted to get as far away from her friend's house as possible. There was only one fact they both agreed on – that they should stay together.

Santana didn't trust Quinn not to make her go to church and fake-confess a bunch of made-up sins (and maybe a few real ones) to her priest and Quinn didn't trust Santana not to have sex with someone or tattoo her borrowed body.

The day was actually going really well (with the exception of whole body swap issue). It took a little while for them to get into trading places, but for the most part, they were coping pretty well considering the situation they found themselves in.

It was strange the things they noticed about each other – and themselves.

Quinn, for instance, had never noticed just how often Santana touched her. She decided it was a _Santana's body_ thing because Quinn was always very aware of who she touched, when and how often. She'd always been very careful about showing her affection physically. But she couldn't stop herself from getting Santana's attention with a hand grab or gentle arm poke or from playing around with an elbow nudge or soft shoulder-check. Her body did it without any input from her mind.

Santana was the one with the short end of the stick. With every brush of Quinn's fingers against hers, a weird tingling feeling would shock her fingers. And when Quinn caught her gaze, she couldn't seem to _not _break eye contact and look away. Quinn's body, she decided, was a very uncomfortable place to be.

The two friends commiserated over coffee at the Lima Bean, flipped through magazines in the bookstore and wandered the mall aimlessly waiting for the drink's effects to wear off. There was a brief moment when they almost forgot they weren't exactly themselves.

It took a chance encounter to remind them of their situation.

"Hey, Rachel," Santana said, her sweet voice dripping with insincerity. "I wanted to take a moment to thank you and your somewhat talented flavor-of-the-week boyfriend for inspiring the name for my next Rock Band name."

Rachel wrinkled her nose in confusion and tightened her arm around Brody's.

"Donkey Face and the Hobbit," the other girl stated proudly. "What do you think? Classic, right? I'm thinking of making the drummer a bearded lady. You know, full on ZZ Top in your honor."

Brody clenched his jaw in annoyance but Rachel actually looked hurt.

"Quinn," she said softly, "is there a reason you're being so rude? I expect that kind of thing from Santana," she paused, her eyes skirting to where Quinn stared at her wide-eyed, "but not from you."

Santana cursed under her breath. Through clenched teeth, she forced herself to say, "Sorry, Rach." She worked hard not to roll her eyes at using the girl's nickname. "Spending too much time around Santana, I guess."

"Totes," Quinn added, for no other reason than she was sure she was supposed to say _something_. Santana always had _something _to say.

"Oh, good god," Santana said before dragging Quinn away from the couple. When she felt they were far enough away from anyone they knew, she whispered harshly, "I don't talk like that."

"You kind of do," Quinn stated firmly.

"I don't. And you need to," she said, stepping into the other girl's space and, just for a moment, she lost her train of thought.

"I need to what?" Quinn raised her brows and touched her friend's arm. "Are you okay?"

Santana swallowed roughly, shook her head and took a step back. "Uh," she began before clearing her throat. "You need to start being me because that was a shit impression you just did."

"It wasn't that bad," the other girl said, holding back a chuckle.

"One more _totes_ out of you and I'll drop to my knees and starting doing _Hail Mary_s outside of Victoria's Secret," Santana warned. "Understood?"?

Later, bent on at least a little bit of payback, Santana made the sign of the cross and said, "God bless you" to the boy who gave her change after she bought frozen lemonade. Quinn dragged her away complaining that she will never be able to never show her face at that kiosk again.

Once Quinn let go of her, Santana flexed her fingers and shook out her hand to get rid of the weird ache that pulsed up and into her arm. It was like the aches she used to get in during Cheerio practice when she would relax her muscles after having them tightened for so long. The longer Santana spent in this body, the more uncomfortable she found herself.

In an effort not to run into anyone else they knew, Quinn suggested they go back to her house to wait it out with a _Bring it On _marathon.

The breaking point wasn't when Quinn, ignoring that the couch was large enough to fit nearly all of their New Directions teammates, sat thigh-to-thigh with Santana. And it wasn't when Quinn pushed their shoulders together and looked up at her, beaming. Santana was pretty sure she'd never seen that big of a smile on her own face before.

What did it – what finally made her snap - was when Quinn giggled before leaning even closer to her and asked Santana if she remembered that last week of cheer camp when they decided they _had _to learn the opening routine. The spark that ran up Santana's spine short-circuited her brain and she jumped off the couch, pointing at her friend.

"Okay, what the hell is wrong with you, Q?" she asked. "Is it possible at all for you to control your body?"

Quinn blinked owlishly. "What are you talking about? I've never felt more relaxed and confident in my entire life." She didn't' want to admit it, but for a moment, she'd almost forgotten what it felt like to be in her own skin.

"Not your body!" Santana shouted point to her own body. "_Your_ body!" She vaguely gestured to the body she was borrowing. "The way you react to the simplest things is making me crazy. It's like you're going to explode any second and I really don't want you to do that because _I'm_ in here!"

Quinn pursed her lips and rolled her eyes. "Oh, and you're perfect? Why do you have to touch people for no reason?" She brings her gaze to meet Santana's and flops her hands in front of her face. "They do it before I can even stop them!"

"Your body doesn't seem to be complaining," Santana argued, her voice going from aggravated to teasing. "If anything, maybe your nervous little ticks are signs that you actually really like it. If I didn't know you better, I'd think you had the hots for me, Q. S'that it?"

Quinn's eyes widened and she pressed her lips together tightly.

Santana let out a huff. "You don't get to make your panic face until you have _your_ face back. It looks ridiculous on me, so put it away until you have something to panic about, Let me continue to stand there looking effin' gorgeous, as always. Besides, I was totally just messing with you."

The other girl forced herself to inhale slowly. Quinn had no idea how it was that she was losing control but she didn't like it. If there was anything Quinn was, it was controlled.

"C'mon, Super Hetero Quinn with her Super Powers of Heteronormativity," Santana continued. "doesn't have the gay. You're too uptight for that."

"I'm not too uptight," Quinn said half-heartedly. Controlled and uptight weren't synonymous to the girl.

"You kind of are."

"I am not, Santana."

"You realize you're arguing with me about whether or not you should get an invite to Dinah Shore Weekend, right?" Santana asked, chuckling under her breath. "Not sure it's that important for you to be right on this, Q."

Quinn let out a long breath and repeated, "I'm not too uptight."

"Okay," the other girl began before offering, "a test." She reached out her hand and said, "Hold my hand."

After rolling her eyes at the ridiculous instruction, Quinn stood up and took her friend's hand. "This proves nothing. We've held hands before."

"M'not done." Santana threaded their fingers together and held her hand for a moment longer before squeezing Quinn's hand and letting go. "Okay, hug."

Quinn blew out a frustrated breath and stepped into Santana's embrace. It wasn't like their usual quick hugs. There was no space between them and there were no butterfly pats on her back. Their bodies were flush up against each other's and, though Quinn didn't feel her normal anxiety, she was afraid that Santana might start to.

The flip in Santana's stomach and the way that her fingers twitched warned her that Quinn was going to win this argument.

Stepping back, Quinn started to pull out of the hug. When she was just far enough to meet Santana's eyes, the other girl tightened her hold and didn't let her escape. There was no time to consider an exit strategy before Santana brought their lips together.

Santana wouldn't say that she saw stars when she kissed Quinn, but there were definitely fireworks and maybe a mushroom cloud or two exploding in her chest. Without opening her eyes, she muttered softly, "I'm gonna need a shitload of therapy because I'm totally attracted to me."

When she opened her eyes, Quinn was staring back at her with nervous, hazel eyes. Her bottom lip shyly caught in her teeth, it was clear the other girl didn't know what to do - about anything at all. The confidence and freedom she'd felt had vanished and her body stiffened in Santana's arms anxiously.

Santana didn't know what kind of response the other girl was expecting. Did Quinn think she would make fun of her or maybe just blow it off? Santana couldn't bring herself to do either. She pushed Quinn's hair behind her ear and said, "Last test."

"We're back, Santana. No more tests," Quinn argued nervously. She put on her brave face – the one where her eyes get cold and her face impassive – and nodded, as though it was decided.

"The test," Santana explained evenly, "isn't for you. So suck it up and kiss me, again." She smirked and looked Quinn in the eyes. "I've been you. I know you don't mind …"

The other girl rolled her eyes and pressed her lips into a thin line. "One kiss."

She didn't make Santana wait very long, probably because she knew that the longer she waited, the more nervous she would become. Quinn cupped Santana's cheek and tentatively brushed her lips across the other girl's mouth. When Santana splayed her hands against her back, pulling her friend closer, Quinn's hesitancy fell away and she allowed herself to let go of some of the control she held so tightly.

Unlike most of the kisses Santana had received, this one was slow and measured. It was as if Quinn was forcing herself to take her time, to explore and note every detail of Santana's mouth on hers - to commit the moment to memory.

Quinn was the one to pull away and Santana almost thanked her for it. The intensity of the kiss brought the mushroom clouds and fireworks back. She kissed the corner of Quinn's mouth before resting their foreheads together and jokingly whispered, "… and I thought I was going to need therapy when I was attracted to myself ..."


	4. Thursday: Worth the Price of Admission

_**Title**__: Worth the Price of Admission  
__**Author**__: headcannon  
__**Pairing**__: Quinntana  
__**Prompt**__: Historical Time Period (San Francisco, 1970)_

_**Note**__: I was not alive at this time (though, how much would I have __**loved**__ this?!). I have relied heavily on word of mouth, super hard to read maps (I'm not mapularly© gifted) and, though I'm ashamed to admit it, Wikipedia for names, dates, etc. I don't purport to know anything. I just like writing. _

_And being gay. _

The morning air rushed in through the Muni bus window, cooling Quinn's face. There was an energy - an electricity - swirling on the breeze that, as she watched her Pacific Heights neighborhood disappear behind her, she just couldn't deny. She looked down at the contraband flyer she clutched tightly in her hand and tried not to think about what her parents' reactions would be when she didn't show up for breakfast that morning.

They had forbidden her from going anywhere near the park. Quinn, who was always the obedient child, had never so blatantly disobeyed her parents before. Though she didn't know what the price would be, she was sure she would pay for her transgression.

Just as she was sure it would be worth it.

There was no doubt in Quinn's mind who she was. Her university credits and inclusion on the Dean's list were testaments of her intelligence; but, she didn't need them. Nor did she need her mother to expound upon the virtues of being an independent woman while giving her a demonstration on the proper way to iron her father's suit shirt - Quinn never did get the collar right. But she didn't care because she knew that once she was no longer under her father's roof, she would never again iron a man's shirt.

Quinn's uncertainty wasn't about who she was - it was about the community to which she was supposed to belong.

She was raised to keep her head down, to speak softly and never out of turn - doing otherwise would certainly decrease her prospects for finding a good husband. There were expectations that had to be met if she planned to continue to enjoy the perks that came with her parents' affluent lifestyle.

Her parents didn't know, of course, that Quinn's plans had changed and she'd been preparing for the life she wanted without their knowledge. The morning's trip was the girl's way of testing herself and finding out if she could, like the community she was about to meet, speak with conviction - if she could say out loud the words that she had only whispered under her breath to herself.

The bus slowed as it reached Polk Gulch and Quinn's attention was drawn to the street outside where a small group – 25? 30? – of hair fairies* were marching down Polk Street. Her breath caught in her throat as she watched these people walk so freely in public, unashamed - proud.

They held their heads high even as they marched past the few whose only reason for attending was to harass them. The flutter of excitement that Quinn felt in her stomach all morning turned into an anxious churning. She frowned and sat back heavily in her seat.

"What'sa matter, Blondie?" a smoky voice asked from behind her. "Not used to seein' such studly debs? Or are you just mad that those dudes are rocking the Farrah better than you?"

Quinn self-consciously ran her fingers through her hair. With her eyes skirted to the side, she turned her head just enough to catch a glimpse of the person talking to her. Her voice was a low she stammered a softly whispered "Me?"

The girl behind her was wrong, of course. Quinn wasn't frowning because of the men in dresses making their way down the street. They were only unsettling in the way that, unlike her, they knew _how_ to be themselves. Even in the face of those who would shout that they were wrong, they were unapologetic about not fitting into the tiny box of societal expectation.

But Quinn was still learning how to use her voice. She'd been told that her usual method of correcting people made her seem self-righteous, judgmental and hard. If the day was going to be an experiment for Quinn, she was going to have to tread more lightly than usual and choose words that carried her real intent.

"You don't see any other feathered bunnies, do you?"

Pressing her lips together, Quinn blinked a few times and looked at the other passengers on the bus. It was true. She stood out like a sore thumb in her sundress and cardigan, and with her hair expertly feathered. She sighed before turning in her seat to properly address the girl sitting behind her.

Her words died in her mouth when she was met with the most amazing almond-shaped eyes she'd ever seen. The other girl's eyebrows rose in expectation, her full lips pressing together when Quinn simply blinked owlishly at her.

"You know what they say about the heat, doncha?" the girl asked, tilting her head and smirking.

Quinn's simple narrowed her eyes at the girl.

"If you can't stand it, get out of the kitchen." The other girl leaned back in her seat and crossed her tanned legs. Quinn tried not to notice how short the girl's shorts were.

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

The other girl sucked in her cheeks and pursed her lips and then made a gesture to her face. "That's how tight-asses look at people they don't get," she informed her knowingly. "Just saw it on your baby doll face a full on second ago. And let me tell you something, Butterfly – "

Quinn's brow furrowed at the random nickname.

" - just 'cause you don't get it doesn't mean you have any right to put on the sour milk, catch my drift?"

"I –" Quinn's words halted and she wrinkled her nose. "But I wasn't," she waved her finger in an almost circular shape in front of her face, "putting on sour milk. Well, I was, but not like that. I just don't think it's right for those other people to try to stop the parade, that's all."

"Parade?" The girl laughed and shook her head. "Since when are twenty dudes in dresses considered a parade? You're a trip, Butterfly."

"Quinn," she said. When the other girl's brows pushed together, she explained. "My name. It's Quinn."

"Of course it is," the other girl chuckled. "It sounds like an appliance or, like, your old lady's maiden name or something."

"Actually, it _is_ my mom's maiden name," Quinn admitted stiffly.

"Santana," the girl said pointing to herself. "No relation to Carlos, but damn that'd be tight, right? My cousin saw him play and said he totally smashed the Fillmore." At the confused look on the other girl's face, Santana blew out a breath. "You know James Taylor, right?"

"Of course."

"Yeah, okay. That explains it," Santana replied smartly.

The bus ground to a halt and Quinn checked the window for their location.

"Your stop?" Santana asked. When the other girl shook her head and turn in her seat to face her, again, she said. "You might wanna reconsider. Next few aren't your scene." She looked her up and down and added, "Unless you're hiding a hippie under your sweater."

"And it's your scene?" Quinn inquired. "Are you hiding a hippie in your boots?" She allowed her eyes to skim down Santana's legs her high boots.

Santana wasn't a hippie. She didn't disagree with their general ideas of peace and love. And she couldn't lie, she enjoyed hanging out in the Haight because they had amazing weed and no one gave her crap about anything. They were too high to care about who she was sleeping with, what her politics were …

She did, however, prefer a cleaner look for herself. Her dark hair was worn straight – meticulously ironed – and she wore what her father to referred to as "upside down fashion." Instead of long shorts and low boots, she wore short shorts and high boots.

"Nah. Not enough room with this in there." Santana patted one of her boots, pulled out a joint and asked, "You anywhere?"

Not only did Quinn not know what the other girl was asking, she's not sure why she's holding out a rolled up piece of paper toward her.

"Yeah, didn't peg you for a baker but y'know, didn't wanna bogart and have you thinkin' I was rude." Santana ducked her head to check a passing street sign. "My out. Catch ya' on the flipside, Butterfly."

When the bus driver announced the stop and Quinn started to gather her belongings (a crumpled up piece of paper and a little hand bag), it didn't go unnoticed.

"I was serious, y'know," Santana said. "This hang isn't your gig."

"Golden Gate Park is everyone's _gig_," Quinn argued, pushing past her. "And do you ever speak in English?" She didn't wait for an answer and, stepping off the bus, inhaled sharply at the sight that met her.

It reminded Quinn of the photos she saw of the Woodstock Festival – only on a much, much smaller scale. The balloons that decorated the area had the words _gay power_ on them and a large banner read _Freedom Day Revolution Gay-In. _ Her stomach tightened with excitement as she tried to take it all in.

"So, next bus is in, like, 25 or something. You'll be okay here on your own?" Santana asked before double-checking, "How was that? English enough for you?"

Quinn rolled her eyes and unfolded her flyer. Holding it up for the other girl, she firmly stated, "This is my stop."

Santana narrowed her eyes and studied the girl for a moment. It wasn't clear to her what this girl who looked like she stepped off the front of one of those Simplicity sewing patterns thought she was going to do at a gathering like this, but she sure wanted to find out.

Taking the gay-in flyer from her, Santana folded it up and shoved it into her back pocket. "Cool. Let's see what's doing, huh?" She wound her arm through Quinn's and pushed through a small pocket of people. "Watch it, _parade_ comin' through, ya' feel me?"

Quinn didn't question that Santana was joining her. As they wandered through the crowds, she wondered what she was thinking coming to something like this alone. Not that she had anyone she could have brought with her; but, having Santana at her side – even though she'd just met her – made everything a little less overwhelming.

The day was full of eye-opening experiences.

When a group of topless women passed in front of the duo, Quinn's back straightened and her eyes rolled toward the sky as she tried not to look. It took Santana nearly five minutes to get her laughter under control. In an effort to loosen her up, she offered her the joint she'd been carrying around all morning.

Quinn felt that attending the festival was a big enough step. She wasn't ready to add anything else to her plate at the moment. After every few hits, Santana checked again in case the other girl changed her mind. Though she didn't try it, she found that she actually didn't mind the drug's sweet scent.

"This is bullshit," Santana said later that day, after hearing a particularly dramatic coming out story.

The other girl frowned deeply. "You can't call someone else's story bull, Santana."

"I didn't," she replies. "I called it bull_shit_. All of this boo-hoo crap is bullshit and it's not going to get us anywhere. You think anyone wants to hear how that guy," she pointed to a man in a running shorts and a pink tank top, "got beat up for being gay? Do you think that people will change their minds about us because that girl," she nodded to a girl leaning back into another girl's embrace, "got kicked out of her house?"

"But people need to know how bad it can be for," Quinn takes a deep breath, "for us."

"For us, who?" Santana prodded. "What's _your_ story?"

"I don't have a story yet." Quinn swallowed roughly and then reiterated more clearly. "People need to know how bad it can be for us," she paused to let out a breath, "gay people."

The other girl gave her a quick smile, acknowledging the step Quinn took.

"What people, though? Straight people?" she asked, shaking her head. "I'll tell you what, gay people don't need to hear this. _You_ don't need to hear this because all it'll do is scare you. You're gonna hear how tough it is, how much people hate you and you're gonna go back to your pretty house with your pretty family and _pretend_ to have a pretty life."

"That's not going to happen," Quinn stated firmly.

"Sure it's not," Santana said, clearly not convinced.

"And straight people?" she continued, going back to her earlier though. "Do you really think anyone is going to look at us equally when all we do is throw ourselves at their feet and ask for pity?" Santana shook her head and sighed.

"Have you ever heard a good coming out story," Santana's eyes drifted to the brooch clipped to Quinn's sweater, "Butterfly?" When the other girl admitted she hadn't, Santana said, "I have an okay story but do you think anyone wants to hear it?"

Knowing that her own story would most likely be closer to the ones the other girl was complaining about, Quinn softly said, "I want to hear it."

Santana had just gotten home after her late class and was pacing the kitchen while her mom made dinner. She was working up the nerve to tell her – to just say it out loud to someone who actually mattered to her – when her mother glared, pointed her wooden stirring spoon and told Santana to get stop wasting energy wearing out the linoleum and to go set the table.

When her daughter responded with an unplanned, blurted out "but I'm gay," the woman put her hands on her hips and told her daughter that she didn't care and that Santana still had to set the table.

"Sounds better than okay." Quinn smiled softly and said, "It sounds like you have a really great family."

"I didn't get out of setting the table," Santana argued. "And my family is great – great and normal. Well, my mom has kitchen issues," she admitted. "Like she can't share it. She's convinced someone will eat something before dinner and ruin their appetites or something."

The thought of her mother's kitchen reminded her that she had the munchies and she groaned, "I could eat a bear."

A large man walking past slapped her on the back, winked and said, "Me too, honey."

At Quinn's blank expression, Santana promised to explain gay male humor to her another day.

The other girl tried not to expect too much from the promise. She kept herself centered in reality. A chance encounter on a bus, a day spent in the park – Quinn wasn't in the business of hoping.

When the police started to arrest the most vocal of the gatherers, Santana ushered Quinn away from the crowd. "You really should take off," she said with a sad smile. "Your parents are probably going to be pretty pissed that you were even here. Don't add jail time to the deal, huh?"

"I had a really nice time," Quinn said. "Thank you for spending the day with me."

"Yeah, well, I couldn't let you wander around lost and confused, could I?" Santana shrugged, neither knowing how nor wanting to say goodbye to the other girl. "Hope you found what you were lookin' for, Butterfly."

"I think I did." Quinn nodded softly and, unpinning her brooch, put it in the other girl's hand. "Thank you."

Santana clipped the pin to her shirt and smiled brilliantly at her. The smile when she spotted the Muni bus pulling up to the curb. "That's you," she said.

The other girl looked over her shoulder and saw the _Pacific Heights_ board in the front window. "Just for now," she said. Her eyes skirted back to the crowd that was breaking up in the field behind them and Santana twisted to see what the other girl was looking at. When she turned back, Quinn locked her gaze with Santana's. "That's me, too," she said with certainty.

She placed one hand on Santana's shoulder, using it for balance as she placed a quick kiss to the other girl's cheek. Santana wanted to ask her to go somewhere else with her - back to North Beach, maybe, to one of the few cafes the beatniks don't gather or even back to her place where, she knew her mother would welcome any guest Santana brought home. But the bus door was already closing and she could see Quinn settling into a window seat before she could figure out a way to get the request out.

There was no pride festival the following year. Whether the event promoters didn't think a couple of hundred people were worth the work or whether the community was still wary after the arrests made the year before, Santana didn't know. She told herself she wasn't going to go, anyway. There was nothing that could happen that would beat the experience she'd had the year before.

When her bus stopped, she climbed out and checked the paper in her hand for the address of the bookstore. This was the right place – Castro Street.

She'd never been in a book store that carried books catering to the gay population. Santana didn't even know that there were enough books written about gay people to stock a bookstore. The bell jangled over the door as she walked into the small bookshop.

"Can I help you?" a soft voice asked from behind the counter. The small gasp that followed pulled Santana's attention from a display of Gore Vidal's works.

After a moment of surprise, Santana smirked and asked, "You lost, Butterfly? This ain't Pacific Heights."

Quinn shook her head, put down the copy of _The Wild Boys_ she was reading and laughed." No, it definitely isn't." She wrinkled her nose cutely and smiled, "I don't actually live there, anymore."

Concern crossed the other girl's features. "You got a story now?"

"I do," Quinn admitted. "Do you want to hear it," she paused and bit her lip, "after I close up?"

That evening, as they walked down Castro after sharing pizza, Santana learned that Quinn arrived home to a hysterical mother – and an absent father. They'd heard on the evening news about the riot – Santana laughed because she was there and it didn't seem like a riot to her – and her father had gone to the police station to find her.

"I felt so badly," Quinn said, though the smirk she was trying to hide said otherwise. "My mom kept crying and bringing up Kent State. She actually said _thank god_ when I told her that I was at a gay rally and not a Cambodian campaign protest." She wrinkled her nose and said, "I don't think she understood what we meant by Freedom Day Revolution."

"Sounds like an okay story," Santana eventually said.

"Well, I know how you dislike sob stories," Quinn countered. "So, I left out the part where my dad came home and yelled at me for two hours about sneaking out of the house. It was loud and unpleasant. And normal."

She tilted her head and said, "I told them that night, in no uncertain terms, that I'm gay. They didn't – they still don't – like it but the love me, so." Quinn shrugged. "I don't live out here now because I got kicked out or because my parents don't talk to me. I chose to move out, to get a job and pay rent and all of that other stuff."

"So, no regrets, then." Santana nodded, impressed. "Good."

Quinn stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and sighed. "I didn't say that. There's one and I completely blame the Muni schedule for it."

"The Muni?"

"If it was a few minutes later, I think I would have been able to work up the courage to do this," Quinn took a step forward and, touching her fingertips to the other girls' cheek, brushed her lips against Santana's.

"Stupid public transportation," Santana muttered with a smile against her lips before resting her hands on Quinn's hips and pulling her closer. She tightened her hold as she pressed forward into a firmer kiss – she wasn't interested in fleeting kisses that didn't hold promises.

Quinn had left her with one of those before and she'd chased it like a ghost for over a year. When she closed her eyes, she could feel the other girl's lips press against her cheek, just barely missing the corner of her mouth. But when she opened her eyes, it was gone.

This time, when she opened her eyes, she was met with a brilliant smile. Santana couldn't keep herself from beaming back at Quinn. "Better? Do you feel like you got your money's worth now?"

Quinn chuckled. "It was a free event," she paused and cleared her throat before touching the butterfly pin stuck to the flap of the other girl's woven handbag, "Butterfly."

*_Hair fairies_ was the term for members of the male transgender community in 1970


	5. Friday: Don't Get Sad, Get Even

**Title:** Don't Get Sad, Get Even  
**Author:** headcannon  
**Pairing:** Quinntana  
**Prompt:** Head Canon (episode: _Funeral_)  
**Note:** Because I'm behind, I'm going to try something new: a (super) short one shot. Wish me luck.

Quinn glared at Finn through the passenger window of his truck before turning on her heel and marching away. She squared her jaw and inhaled deeply, furious with herself for letting him see her cry over him.

"Q!" Santana called out, her heels clicking hurriedly on the asphalt. "Hold up."

Brushing the back of her hand under her eyes, Quinn slowed her gait and hesitantly turned around. "Shouldn't you be with Brittany?" she asked, too tired to inject her usual venom into the question.

Santana shook her head, pushing her lips into a little frown. "She's getting the flowers and stuff together for Sue to take home." She glanced over her shoulder at Finn's truck and saw the boy sitting inside, staring straight out of the windshield, and she asked, "You need a ride?"

Hesitant at first, Quinn inhaled deeply and blinked a few times before answering, "Yeah. That'd be great."

The ride to Quinn's house was pretty quiet. Santana didn't really expect it to be otherwise. She and Quinn didn't have that kind of relationship – the kind where they talked to each other.

They screamed at each other, teased each other and sometimes even hit each other; but, for the most part, Brittany was their go-to talking person. When Santana wanted Quinn to know something, she simply gave their shared best friend the okay and Brittany told Quinn everything she needed to know. There was rarely a time when the two girls spoke directly to each other about anything emotional.

"So," she started when they got inside the house, "you're kind of more broken up about Sue's sister than you kind of should be." Santana threw herself onto the couch and shucked off her heels with a relieved sigh.

Quinn furrowed her brow and scowled. "She was a nice lady," she said. "But that's not it."

"Don't tell me had another girl-fight with Finnessa." Santana rolled her eyes and suggested, "Wait 'til she's done PMSing before you try to talk to her. You know how she gets when she's hormonal."

"He broke up with me," Quinn commented evenly.

At her friend's confused look, she explained, "After the funeral." Quinn allowed her body to fall heavily onto the couch and she sighed. "For Rachel." Her voice hardened as she said the other girl's name.

"Well good!" Santana frowned. "Why would you even want a boy who, when given the choice of two birds, chooses the one who actually has a beak? Forget it. You can do better."

"Can I?" Quinn sniffled and then closed her eyes tightly in a vain effort not to start crying again. "I can't even keep a stupid boy like Finn Hudson interested. What's wrong with me?" She turned to her friend and asked, "Am I not pretty enough?"

"It doesn't make sense because he just keeps choosing _her_," Quinn continued. "I don't know why he never chooses me." Her eyes were trained on her hands, clasped in her lap, so her friend couldn't tell if she was still doing the eye-leak or not.

Santana chewed her lip wishing like hell that Brittany would magically appear. This was well out of her range of expertise. She wasn't the girl anyone went to for heart-to-heart talks; she was the girl they went to for revenge tactics and witty tear-downs.

She smiled, her eyes narrowing in delight. "I don't know why you keep choosing _him," _Santana offered

Quinn rolled her eyes and looked at her friend. "He's the type of boy I'm supposed to end up with, Santana." She frowned and added, "I know you don't get it, but that's how it goes. Boys like him and girls like me – that's the formula."

"No, y'know, I get that, kinda of," Santana replied simply. "I mean, it's stupid and ridiculous, but hey, you've got a path and you're following it. Fine. But, what I don't get is why you're crying about it and not making plans, instead."

"I'm not getting him back," her friend stated firmly.

"That's _exactly_ what you should be doing," Santana suggested. "Getting him back. Are you really gonna take this or is Finn gonna get what's coming to him? I mean, who even breaks up with someone at a funeral, anyway? He deserves whatever you give him."

"I'm tired of playing games, Santana," the other girl said sadly. "I don't have the energy for revenge."

"Who says you actually have to do anything?" Santana asked. "Sometimes the best revenge is making someone think you're gonna do something," she paused, her lips twitching into a smirk, "and then making them wait for it. You don't ever have to follow through. You just have to make them think you will."

Later that week, Santana overheard Finn laying some condescending crap on Quinn about being proud her for not quitting Glee Club. She couldn't contain her smile when she heard the other mention that she couldn't quit because she had big plans for their New York trip. And the eerie way Quinn said, "You'll see" almost had Santana clapping and whistling for an encore.


	6. Saturday: Operation: Playground

**Title:** Operation: Playground  
**Author:** headcannon  
**Pairing:** Quinntana  
**Prompt:** Spies/Secret Agents  
**Notes:** I wanted to do something different – cute. Not sure what's cuter than a rag-tag bunch of 8-year-olds trying to steal kisses at the playground.

Just outside of the sandbox, six kids huddled with their heads pressed together. Every few seconds, one would look up to make sure no one was listening in.

"Alright," Santana, the ringleader, began getting the group's attention. "Targets."

A short boy with a faux-hawk grinned. "I call L to the Z." He pulled out of the huddle to look for the girl. Lauren was standing at the top of the slide collecting cookies. Those who didn't have any weren't permitted to use the slide and, instead were pointed to the pole or the ladder.

"Dibs on Tina?" Mike said unsurely. His friends nodded their consent and he gave a small fist pump. "Awesome!"

"Do we hafta call it?" Sam asked, pushing his shaggy blond hair out of his face. His eyes skirted to Brittany, also in the huddle.

Santana adjusted her short-alls and rolled her eyes. "Doesn't matter, we all know who you got. I call," she held out the word, pretending to think about it, "Q."

Sam poked his head out of the huddle to look for Santana's target. The girl was sitting on the short wall surrounding the sandbox and was already nose-deep in a book. "Aw, Quinn's not playing?"

"She's playing," Santana said confidently. "She just doesn't know it, yet."

The tallest boy scrunched up his face and asked, "What if my target's on the swings?"

Santana rolled her eyes. "Then getting her off the swing is part of your objective. Never catch your target in motion - unless you want to lose a tooth." She squinted at him and tilted her head. "You might look better with less teeth, Bigfoot."

"Now, let's go over the blueprints, again," she said, pretending to unroll a large sheet of paper.

Early in the summer, back when they started working out the rules to their little game, the kids came up with a mental blueprint of the playground. Every piece of equipment came with its own set of obstacles.

"Swings," she called out.

"Five swings, including baby buckets. Run through without being sighted to secure the area. Do _not_ get kicked by swingers," Finn recited.

"Slide."

"Ladder is within eye-line of target," Puck noted. "Use fireman pole or climbing net for sneak attack from the rear. In case of sighting, blend in with civilians. Beware of target using slide for quick escape."

"Good," Santana said, impressed with the boy's thoroughness. "Field?"

Sam sighed and informed her, "Use trees for cover and approach with care." He frowned in Brittany's direction. "Some targets have monkey DNA and can climb trees super fast."

"And?" Santana prompted him.

"And." The boy blinked a few times as he tried to remember anything else about this area. "Oh! Chases! This area is prime for high speed chases so be prepared in the event the target flees on foot."

"Jungle gym, Britt Britt?"

The taller girl beamed and said, "Monkey walk across, climb to the top. All contact is impossible."

"Mission Impossible," the other girl corrected gently. "All contact is _Mission Impossible_ - hanging upside down."

"And finally," Santana continued, her small voice lowering ominously, "the wall." She poked at the air, pretending to poke the paper. "Sneak attacks are ill-advised as target may fall if startled. The wall offers little cover so operative must be in disguise or have the target's trust. Undercover, covert – this is not the quadrant for a rookie."

Her friends nodded solemnly in agreement. Finn even reached out and patted her shoulder before wishing her luck.

The small girl clapped her hands together and announced, "Alright operatives, you have your missions. Meet back here at oh-nine-hundred for debriefing and the final tally."

Noting the confusion on a few of the faces in front of her she rolled her eyes and clarified, "When Artie's dad drops him off - nine o'clock. Once the van is gone, the game's over. Come back here and we'll see who the winners are."

The small group broke their huddle with a loud "hoo!" and took off in various directions.

Brittany took off a break-neck speed toward the jungle gym. There weren't any kids in hanging from the bars. Sam shadowed her, trying to figure out the girl's game plan.

Finn crouched down and duck-walked alongside the slide play set. Lauren looked over the bar above the top of the slide and rolled her eyes at him.

"What are you doing Finn _Duck_son?" she bellowed from above. "If you're thinking about my slide, you had better have some Tollhouse on you. This is my house," she announced. "You gotta pay the toll."

A little girl offered her a cookie and Lauren moved out of the way to let her pass.

Finn answered Lauren by holding his finger over his lips and shushing her. His eyes darted to the swings and he let out a short breath. The interaction wasn't enough to alert his target but it was just the distraction Puck needed as he ran from his hiding place, under the play set and to the climbing net.

All of Santana's operatives were en route to rendezvous points with their targets. With a sharp nod to herself, she steeled her resolved and headed over to the wall. She watched her target carefully as she approached, trying to decide her course of action. Play it cool and be conversational? Or might element of surprise work?

Quinn was halfway through the first chapter of the new Cam Jansen mystery her daddy bought her when a shadow fell across over the page.

"So, whatcha reading, Q?" Santana asked, her hands stuffed into her front pockets as she rocked on her heels.

Quinn blinked up at her friend and squinted. She held up her book and raised her brows.

"Cool," Santana commented as she hopped onto the wall and started using it as a balance beam. "What's it about?"

"A girl with a photographic who memory solves mysteries," Quinn explained. "This one's about UFOs."

With her arms out at her side, Santana on one foot and asked, "You believe in that stuff? Area 50-something and government experiments and aliens and stuff?"

Quinn laughed and shook her head. "No, but it's a nice story, anyway."

"So, this girl in the book – does she get to use cool secret agent gadgets? Like, decoder keys and bugs and lasers and stuff?" Santana switched feet and hopped in place on the wall with ease.

"Just binoculars and magnifying glasses," her friend answered quietly.

"Oh, bummer." The other girl hopped off the wall and sat next to Quinn. "Sounds kinda boring."

Before Quinn could answer, a series of shouts erupted by the swing set and Santana pressed her lips together to try to hide her elated smile. Finn Hudson was down.

It wasn't like he hadn't tried. It's just that he had a really hard time figuring out when to start running because the swings weren't timed right. It wasn't like one was always going up while another was coming down. Sometimes they moved together and sometimes they didn't. It was super confusing.

While he was busy contemplating whether or not it counted as a hit if a civilian jumps off and the swing hits him, a shiny pair of Mary Janes appeared in front of his eyes. It turned out that rules about empty swings didn't matter. From Rachel Berry's manic, high-pitched voice and the way she kept poking Finn's forehead and asking if he was okay, it was obvious that she was the one that got him.

Still looking past her friend Santana snorted. "Looks like Berry got him right in his big ol' head." She stretched out her legs, a quick "boosh!" shooting from her mouth before she stuck out her tongue and crossed her eyes. "Man down," she stated with finality.

"I hope he's okay," Quinn said, her voice soft with concern.

Santana shrugged. "He'll live. Maybe she knocked some sense into him or something."

The two girls sat quietly for a moment before Quinn asked curiously, "How come you're not playing with them today? Shouldn't you be running around, shouting code words and dodging invisible bullets?"

"Oh, no! That's what I forgot!" Santana eyes widened. She turned where she sat and yelled, "Jackie Chan! Don't forget the snipers in the field!"

Mike, with a fistful of flowers, dropped to the grass, looked over his shoulder and gave Santana a thumb's up. She watched him army crawl toward the backside of the tree where Tina and Sugar were making daisy chains. His tactic was clear: lady-killer James Bond.

Quinn frowned. "Jackie Chan?"

"Classified information, sorry."

Puck shouted a celebratory "Yes!" that echoed out onto the playground and brought both girls' attention to the slide. He was hopping up and down with one hand against his eye and the other holding up a cookie triumphantly.

"Get off my slide, Puckerman!" Lauren wiped the back of her hand against her cheek, grabbed the collar of Puck's shirt and pushed him down the slide.

"Ha! Lopez!" Puck stumbled to his feet once he reached the bottom of the slide. Punching his first into the air, he shouted, "I got one point _and_ a cookie!"

Quinn bit her lip. "Is he winning?"

Santana shrugged. "For now. The cookie doesn't actually count for anything, though." Wincing at the redness surrounding his eye she added, "Neither does getting punched in the face."

"Can I ask something about your game?" After a quick nod from her friend, Quinn squinted and asked, "How do the points work?"

"Sorry, that's confidential information, miss." Santana shook her head. "You haven't been cleared for that level of intel."

"Oh, okay." Quinn opened her book and started reading again.

Santana wrinkled her nose cutely and frowned in confusion. "S'that it? You're not even going to try to get the information from me?"

The other girl giggled and looked over her book. "Isn't that _your_ job?"

"I guess," Santana agreed slowly.

"If you don't want to tell me, you don't have to." Quinn gave her a sweet smile and turned her attention back to the book.

The other girl scratched her head, narrowing her eyes at her friend. "But if you were, say, a friendly or, oh! Or a sleeper! Well, then I'd have to tell you."

"A sleeper?" her friend asked dubiously. "I think I'll stick with Cam. It seems less complicated."

Santana shrugged and offered, "Complicated is fun! Like, when there's lasers, right? And you can't touch 'em?" She sniffed and said, "Just walking in and getting what you want – without like, lasers and code words and super high tech gadets? That's kinda dumb."

"It's not dumb. It requires intelligence and the ability to act without the help of computers," Quinn said, defending her book. "And if you've ever seen a real spy movie, you'd know that the computer always fails and, when it does, it's nothing but trouble."

"Eh, whaddayou know about spy movies, Harriet?" Santana grumbled.

"Lots, actually." Quinn pretended to be done with the conversation and forced her eyes to skim the lines on the page in front of her.

Santana studied the girl. She watched the way Quinn's eyes moved as she read and watched how carefully she turned to the next page. With a tilt of her head, she interrupted the other girl's book to ask, "Lots – like what?"

"Like decrypting passwords, getting into locked rooms and," Quinn paused to look around before leaning closer to her friend and whispering, "undercover code words."

The other girl's eyes widened. Had she had her head in the game, she would have recognized this as her opportunity. Quinn's cheek was right there. A tiny, little lean forward and – she'd have her point.

Instead, she took Quinn's bait and asked, her eyes wide with wonder, "Like what?"

"Huh uh." The other girl shook her head. "Classified information."

"Aw, c'mon, Q!" Her eyes lighting up, Santana offered, "Okay, I'll tell you about the game if you tell me some cool undercover stuff. Whaddaya say, Q? Deal?"

"Well," Quinn drew out, playing it coy. "I suppose …."

Santana clapped her hands together and turned, straddling the wall to move closer to her friend. "Okay, whaddaya wanna know?"

"How do the points work?" Quinn asked before clarifying, "If Brittany gets Sam, and then he gets her back, who gets the point?

"They both do," Santana informed her friend. "Britt Britt would get two for getting Sam because he's playing and should be more observant. And," she thought about it for a moment, "I suppose Sam would still get his one. But not two because she got him first."

She gave Quinn a firm nod and prompted, "Oh, you now."

"Well, what happened to Puck? When Lauren caught on?" the girl began, "that's called getting _burned_. Like, found out. And when Mike snuck a flower to Sam for Brittany?"

Santana looked over to the jungle gym and frowned. How had she not seen that?

"Brush pass. It's in _all_ the spy movies, only it's usually information disks or notes and not flowers," Quinn said smartly. "My favorite, though," she teased, her voice once again lowering and her eyes skirting to the side.

"Yeah?" Santana asked eagerly.

The other girl crooked her finger, beckoning the other girl closer. She cupped her free hand against her mouth and whispered into her friend's ear, "Double agent."

Santana wrinkled her nose. _Double agent?_ That wasn't a new term to Santana. She used it all the time.

In all honestly, she thought it was kind of a dull favorite to have. It wasn't until Quinn seized the opportunity and Santana felt her friend's smirk pressed firmly against her cheek that she realized what just happened – what she fell for.

"Two points, right?" Quinn double-checked.

Santana rolled her eyes and pouted. Spying Artie's dad's minivan pulling up to the playground, she let out a huff and whined, "Aw, man!"

"Game's over?"

"Soon as the van leaves," Santana affirmed sullenly.

"Then I'd hurry, if I was you." Quinn raised her brows and pointed to her cheek. "Unless you want Puck to beat you," she teased.

Moments later, Artie's dad pulled away from the playground and the agents regrouped to debrief from their missions. Santana tried to get Quinn to come over for the tally, but the girl just shook her head and held up her book.

Puck, as everyone knew, not only secured a cheek-kiss, earning himself a point, but he also got a black eye _and_ a chocolate chip cookie. Santana gave him bragging rights – but no extra points.

Mike's plan backfired, rendering his mission a failure. When he presented his handful of flowers to Tina, she happily accepted them and gave him a kiss on the cheek for his effort. He couldn't bring himself to be too upset about losing out on the points when Tina invited him to share her gummy bears.

Poor Sam gave up on Brittany about twenty minutes into the game. She spent their mission time humming the theme song to _Kim Possible_ and calling Sam "Wade." If he approached her while she was hanging upside down, she'd flip herself up to a seated position on top of the jungle gym. If he climbed to the top of the jungle gym, she'd let herself fall backward and hang upside down. There was no catching her.

It was the quickest debriefing in the history of their game. Santana was already running back to the wall when she announced the tie between herself and Puck.

"So, this Cam girl," she began, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with Quinn. "She just uses binoculars, huh?"


	7. Sunday: Mean What You Say

**Title**: Mean What You Say  
**Author**: Headcannon  
**Pairing**: Quinntana  
**Prompt**: Free day  
**Notes**:  
1. Nothing here but the beginnings of fluff, folks. Also? AU.  
2. I'm toying with the idea of (read as: definitely) continuing this one - much later. After everything else has been cleared from the "to do" list. 3. This is not the story I originally intended to tell. That one, as it turns out, is not a one-shot. It will require multiple chapters (and more time/thought/energy than I can put into it right now). It is definitely a story I want to tell, though. I just want to give it the attention it requires and do it right.  
4. This is my last Quinntana Week 2013 prompt (So very late). Thank you all for letting me play with you for the week(s). It's been great writing for you.

Quinn looked over her desk and nodded to herself. Two piles of papers, one graded and the other not, were stacked tidily and her _If You Can Read This_,_ Thank a Teacher_ mug held extra pencils and her grading pens like a flower arrangement. She pressed her hands flat against her stomach to calm her nerves as she looked around the classroom making sure everything was as it should be.

She'd never had a parent-teacher conference that wasn't part of Back to School week or that she hadn't initiated. Her breath caught in her throat as she read the note written in the receptionist's slanted hand: _Micah Lopez's mother called. Wants a conference. Return call or give Judy best time to set it up. _ After giving the receptionist a few times to offer to Micah's mother, Quinn went back to her classroom to come up with a game plan.

It was no mystery why she was being asked for a meeting. Quinn had a feeling she'd be hearing from parents after the lesson she presented just a few days before. She hadn't planned it; but, after what she'd heard on the playground, she just couldn't _not _do it. Quinn had learned to let go of some of her pet peeves: the use of _huh?_ instead of _excuse me?_, the drumming of pencil erasers on desks, and the constant use of the misnomer _Mrs._ Fabray. But this one - she couldn't let slide.

When her students filed into class from recess, they took their seats and looked up in confusion at the chalk board. Their teacher had written _That's so gay _in large letters across the board. Before recess, she'd said that they were going to have a vocabulary review - this wasn't exactly what Quinn had in mind for the lesson.

"So, what does this mean?" she asked her class.

"It means something is lame!" a little boy with shaggy brown hair shouted as he put his hand in the air. Quinn quirked her eyebrow at him and he argued, "What? I raised my hand!"

"Wait to be called on next time, Tyler," she reminded him. Turning to the board, Quinn wrote _lame _next to the phrase. "Anything else?"

Hands went up and one by one, Quinn wrote their explanations on the board: _stupid_, _retarded_, _dumb. _When she'd heard enough, she put her chalk down. Placing her hands on her hips, she let her eyes take in the children in front of her. It was something she did whenever she was considering how to share important information with such young minds.

"What do you think about these words?" Quinn finally asked, pointing behind her to the list they provided. "Are they words you'd want someone call you?"

The entire class shook their heads. This was the tricky part, she knew. This was the part where she had to connect the connotations to the "g" word. "And what about this word," she asked, turning to underline the word _gay_.

Quinn was met with silence.

Quinn wasn't the type of teacher who would let silence prompt her to speak. She gave her students a few moments to contemplate, to work up the nerve to attempt to give an answer or to come up with a clarifying questions. She was that teacher who let them twist until one of them finally broke and offered _something _to the conversation.

A few of the kids wrinkled their noses in confusion. One boy tugged nervously on his sweatshirt sleeve, his eyes darting around to his classmates. Discomfort was not what Quinn was going for, so, breaking from her usual model, she let them off the hook.

"Gay," she began calmly, "isn't a bad word. It _doesn't_ mean stupid or lame." Quinn raised her brows, "And this word," she pointed tothe word _retarded_, "will not be tolerated in this classroom. Is that clear?"

After a short chorus of _Yes, Ms. Fabray (_and few _Mrs. Fabray_s), Quinn said. "When you are in my classroom, I expect to you to say what you mean. If something is bad, then say that it's bad. If something is funny, then say that it's funny. Saying that something bad is _gay _makes about as much sense as saying that something bad is a _sock_."

The little boy who had been pulling at his shirt slowly raised his hand.

"Yes, Micah?"

"Socks aren't good or bad," he offered.

Quinn smiled at the curly-haired boy. She'd always made sure to keep an eye on him because he was a little smaller than his classmates; but, the boy didn't need it. She had yet to witness anyone try to bully Micah. If anything, he was one of the more popular kids in the class.

"Exactly. Socks aren't anything but socks. Not good, not bad. It's the person wearing them who holds those qualities, right? Just like the word _gay_." She took a deep breath, fully aware of the line she was walking. "Gay isn't good or bad. It just is and it's up to the person who is gay to decide whether they want to be a good person or a bad person, just like anyone else."

The next fifteen minutes of their vocabulary lesson was spent on coming up with good ways to express what they thought about various happenings, ideas and items in the classroom. Before the lesson was over, Quinn erased the board and wrote _Say what you mean. Mean what you say._

Those words, still printed on the board, greeted Santana when she walked into her son's classroom.

"Dr. Seuss?" she asked, breaking Quinn out of her distracted thoughts.

Bringing her hand to her chest, the other woman turned quickly to look at her guest with wide eyes. Maybe anticipating a confrontation built up her expectations, but the woman standing in front of her wasn't at all what Quinn was picturing.

Not that Quinn had any idea what a religious zealot looked like. Without a picket sign, it would be a hard read on just about anyone. Even so, this woman looked like she stepped out of a magazine - all of her flaws (Quinn wasn't so sure she had any) airbrushed away, her blazer jacket sleeves rolled perfectly and jeans that, paired with calve-hugging boots didn't even dress down her look.

"Sorry, I thought you were expecting me, Mrs. Fabray," Santana said as she stepped into the classroom, her hand held out. "Santana Lopez. Micah's mom."

"Miss," Quinn gently corrected and shook the offered hand. "Sorry, I was," she began, "thinking and - " She shook her head and smiled nervously. "It's nice to meet you. Micah's one of my best students."

The other woman nodded as she looked around the classroom. "He better be." She squinted and pointed to the far wall. "He have any stuff up there?"

"Yes. Right now we've got our class myths and legends up." Quinn led her over to the display wall. "This one is his," she said, pointing to a page with a line of tornadoes twisting across the top. "Very creative explanation of how the Grand Canyon was formed."

Santana smiled softly and touched the page. "He spent more time drawing the tornadoes than he did writing the story," she confessed. Side-eyeing her son's teacher she said, "If you ask me, I think he was trying to impress you."

Everything she knew about her son's teacher was imparted on her by her son. He told her that Ms. Fabray doesn't show a lot of videos in class but that, sometimes during reading time, she'll get an extra copy of their book and read a few pages out loud to them. He seemed very impressed by her reading ability. Micah also mentioned that she expects everyone to say something during class every day and that sometimes he doesn't say anything all day on purpose just to see if she'll notice. And she does. Without fail.

The only thing he said about his teacher's appearance was that he thought she might be _as old _as his mother. That, of course, got him a lecture about how to phrase age comments when speaking to a lady.

It didn't surprise her, looking at Quinn, that her son was so enamored of the woman. Her blond hair was closely cropped and styled in a very un-styled way. It was free and young - and fun. She looked feminine in her sundress but the cardigan over it reminded her of her old elementary school librarian who never permitted drinks or talking in the library.

Quinn blinked a few times. "Is that so?" She shook her head gently and chuckled. There were a few playground conversations she overheard in which the kids voted on the top teachers. Quinn was usually at the top of the list because, even though she expected her students to learn a lot, she also tried to make learning fun. And the fact that she was "really pretty for being so old" probably didn't hurt.

She tried not to take it personally. Twenty-six, she reminded herself, was pretty old to ten-year-old kids.

"Yeah," Santana answered as she tore her eyes from her son's assignment. "He talks about you a lot. In fact," she began, her brows raising, "I got an earful the other day about one lesson that he found particularly engaging."

Quinn inhaled and pressed her lips together, her hands clasping over her stomach. "About that …" she started, not really sure what she was going to say. She wasn't going to apologize - that much she knew. But she hadn't really figured out a way to soften it, either.

"Thank you for going out on a limb like that," the other woman said at the same time, effectively stopping Quinn's train of thought. "Not a lot of teachers would do that, you know? Take a whole class to task over something like that."

Quinn blinked owlishly at Santana.

"I'm serious," the other woman said. "You've got a room full of fourth graders and they call each other names all day and they push each other around and you have to pick your battles. That's what I've been told, at least. Ever since Micah was in preschool, I've been told that his teachers have to pick their battles." Santana's lips quirked at the corners and she added, "I guess I just wanted to thank you for choosing this one."

"So, you're not mad …" Quinn slowly said, double-checking.

Santana laughed and shook her head. "I'm not mad. Why would I be?" She pointed to a chair near the teacher's desk, the only one not made for tiny bodies other than the teacher's chair, and asked, "May I?"

"Yes! Oh, sorry, yes, please sit down." Quinn kept a firm grasp on her hand in an effort not to extend it in front of herself like a maitre d.

Once she was seated, Santana raised her brows in expectation and was met with another wide-eyed blink. "Oh, waitaminnit," she said with a chuckle, "Did you think I was coming here to bitch you out for using the word _gay_ in front of my son?"

"Honestly?" Quinn asked, wrinkling her nose cutely.

Santana narrowed her eyes and studied her in a way that made Quinn nervous.

"It's just - I don't think I've ever had a parent call me to thank me before. So, you setting up an appointment," she paused in her explanation and winced, "I was preparing myself for bible verses and maybe even a threat or two. I don't know, maybe you wanted to go the principal or the school board or - I don't know."

Santana pressed her lips together and tilted her head. "You know what? I've got a bible verse for you," she said. "Love each other as I have loved you. John fifteen-twelve."

Watching the other woman lean against the desk and rest her hands on the wooden top instead of clamping together in front of her, Santana explained, "You expecting me to come here to cause trouble is exactly why I had to make the appointment. Someone's gotta reinforce that what you're doing is right. If I didn't and someone else came in, like you expected, all it would do is turn away a much-needed ally."

"It's hard enough to know who our allies are without finding out after someone else comes along to shut them up, you know?" Santana asked. "So, it's partially selfish of me. I've got a kid in your class and I sure as hell don't want him hearing anyone saying that his family isn't good or acceptable or whatever it is the kids were saying."

Quinn blew out a breath and looked down at her hands. "That's why Micah looked nervous." She looked up, her blond hair hanging down to partially cover her eyes. "I never would have put him on the spot, Mrs. Lopez. I hope you know that. I didn't even know - "

"Miss," the other woman corrected with a smirk. "But, please. Santana, okay? Miss sounds," she paused, grimacing, "formal or something."

The other woman's mouth twisted as she pulled her bottom lip between her teeth. "I don't know if it's appropriate for me to call my students' parents by their first names."

"Tom did last year," Santana informed her. "Granted, he also hit on me, so …" she teased, "maybe not the best example of appropriateness, huh?"

"Maybe not." A tiny giggle broke from Quinn's throat and the other woman told herself that it wasn't cute. Or, that it would be cute if the woman wasn't her kid's teacher. But, as the woman _was_ her kid's teacher, it was - decidedly un-cute and not at all endearing.

Forcing herself to get back to the matter at hand, Santana cleared her throat and said, "Look, you were an ally for me and my kid, even if you didn't know it. So, if anyone complains or anything, I hope you know that I'll back you up. It's a two-way street, you know?"

"I'm not -" Quinn shook her head. "I don't want to give you the wrong idea, Miss Lopez."

"Santana," the woman reminded her. "And, what? You're teaching kids that it's not okay to call something gay but you aren't an ally?"

"I don't want to disappoint you, but I can't be an ally," Quinn admitted. "I'm just someone who learned to stand up for myself, that's all. I just didn't think it would be appropriate to share that much information with a bunch of fourth graders."

Disappointed wasn't the word that came to Santana's mind. Unfair, maybe. A good looking, seemingly smart, _gay_ woman - and her career was centered around kids. Santana's kid included. She was pretty sure there was some rule against parent and teacher fraternization.

Santana shrugged and said, "You still went out on a limb. So, I owe you."

"You don't owe me anything, Miss Lo-" The other woman's raised brow prompted a quick revision. "Um, Santana. But I do appreciate knowing that I'm not alone in believing it was the right thing to do. It does mean a lot to me to know that there's support for me, should I need it."

Santana grabbed one of the pens from the mug on Quinn's desk and quickly scribbled on a pad of post-it notes. "If anyone calls you into question over your lesson, this is my number. Or, if you ever just wanna talk about any of this stuff - or, whatever." After replacing the pen and sticking the post it on the desk next to where the other woman was leaning, she got up and put her hand out again. "It was nice meeting you."

"You too," Quinn said, shaking her hand. "Thank you for taking the time to meet with me."

"Any time."

She watched Santana walk to the door and, when the other woman turned around, a smirk on her face at catching Quinn looking at her so intently, Santana repeated, "Any time. And you really should use that number some time."


End file.
